However, Bündchen’s latest project, a lingerie campaign for the Brazilian label Hope, has appalled government officials in her homeland and led to calls for the “sexist” and “stereotyped” adverts to be axed. The Women’s Rights Secretariat said in a statement that it has asked the National Advertising Council to suspend the ad, saying it reinforces stereotypes of women as sex objects.
The Hope commercial first shows Bündchen dressed in a sophisticated sheath which she later takes off to reveal the company’s new underwear line while telling her husband that she crashed the car and exceeded her credit card limit. The brand wanted to show that a “Brazilian woman’s sensuality is her best protection when delivering bad news”.
Government officials, however, failed to see the funny side of the ad, demanding it be pulled from television schedules. “The campaign promotes the misguided stereotype of a woman as a sexual object of her husband and ignores the major advances we have achieved in deconstructing sexist practices and thinking,” said the secretariat.
Officials said they had received at least six complaints from outraged viewers since the campaign went to air on September 20.
In a statement, Sandra Chayo, the lingerie company’s director, hit back, claiming that the campaign did not intend to come across as sexist. “Gisele can testify that all of the situations shown in the campaign are jokes about daily life. In no way should they be taken as being depreciative of the feminine figure. It would be absurd for us, who make a living of the preferences of women, to do anything to devalue our main consumer.”
(With additional information from E!ONLINE and guardian.co.uk)
Published in The Express Tribune, October 1st, 2011.
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