Every year, I moan and groan about the awful commercials that we see on television depicting families. Not only is there a paucity of diversity among families, but some products remain so stuck in their gendered ideas about men and women’s roles that they completely alienate me from their products! I’m looking at you, Chlorox. Even the jingle, “Mama’s got the magic of Chlorox!” makes me cringe.
The Cheerios commercial had me at hello, as you can imagine. Cheerios often pulls at my heartstrings. But it was the recent Tide commercial that made me start to feel the holiday spirit.
In the commercial, a dad is chasing after his little girl, who always wears her princess dress. Knowing this, you might think that the commercial annoys me; I can’t stand the princess culture we’ve infested our children with. But in this case, it’s a healthy princess interest; you can easily see how the little girl balances princesses with playing outside, getting messy and even playing Sherriff with her dad. As Melissa Wardy over at Pigtail Pals always says, there are many ways to be a girl (and we can redefine girly!).
Not only do I love that the girl is depicting all these different joyous moments of childhood, but that the dad is enjoying each moment with her and doing laundry. A dad doing laundry is no revolutionary concept, of course; dads do laundry every day. But a commercial depicting it is almost unheard of! I am in love with this commercial, this family, and hopefully a new wave of showing families in all of their forms.
Thanks, Tide!
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia
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