When Propaganda Fails - Gillette: The Best Men Can Be 

I hate that the old ads are supposed to display "toxic masculinity", but they just show a bunch of men working hard, loving their women, and engaging with their little babies and children. The only thing toxic here is the idea that a man working hard and caring for his family is toxic. Also, we haven't bought a single gillette product since this ad came out.

I was travelling for work and forgot my toiletries bag at home. Went to the little convenience shop at the hotel and the only razor in stock was a Gilette. I walked 20min in the cold rain to go to the nearby Walgreens to buy a different brand. That's how powerful this ad was, I will literally go out of my way to not purchase their brand again

The fact that no executive at Gillette spoke up and said “guys…this might be a bad idea you know? We might alienate our entire customer base” is astonishing

When I turned 18 and registered for Selective Service, Gillette sent me a really nice razor thanking me for doing my civic duty. I thought this was so cool that I was happy to buy Gillette products for years. THAT is a good marketing campaign. I was equally happy to stop buying their products when this ad campaign started.

Toxic masculinity in 80s/90s Gillette ads: • monogamy • loving your children • looking after your children • teaching your children • loving your family • striving to achieve your potential

I haven't bought a single Gillette product ever since this ad.

I remember when this ad came out back in 2019...someone commented on the video saying "my wife's son loved this." Gillette pinned the comment and loved it...totally not getting the joke! That's how cut off from reality they are...

16:32 - The fact that the mom is the only "body positive" woman in the commercial and all the career women are fit also says a lot about what Gillette thinks about motherhood.

Gilette: "Roughhousing and developing your strengths is bad." Future woman: "Why did my boyfriend freeze up when that man slapped my arse?" Gilette: "Having confidence and approaching women is bad." Future woman: "Why don't men approach me?"

Shoutout to Amber Heard, for showing everyone that women can do anything, including be a domestic abuser and get convicted in court!

I like how the "cyber bullying" is in texting captions. As if they think the bullies personally text your phone number to pick on you 🤣

As someone who used to work in P&G's worldwide ad agency making ads for them, I can confirm that P&G market researched the HECK out of each second of the ad (via storyboards, animatics) before we even shot a single second on tape. Every single second of this ad was meticulously crafted just as stated in the video.

The worst part of the gillete commercial imo is the implication that roughhousing is bad. It's proven that roughhousing or "rough and tumble play" is vital to the mental and social development of children including females. It is completely natural and healthy behavior which has unique benefits which cannot be obtained any other way. But lets just forget all that and ruin our children for "feminsm"

As a woman, I’ve only ever been bullied by other women. Especially now since voicing any concern for men’s rights deems me a “pick me” - but jokes on them, I have been picked. I’d rather be a pick me than a skip me 💅🏻

That old commercial showed you, that you can be whatever you want to be. A caring and loving father, son and husband, fun friend, great at your job and hobbies... what the hell is wrong with that?!

In this world where I am completely overwhelmed by the amount of selection while shopping, I do so appreciate these companies making that burden of choice just a little bit easier with advertisements like these.

The Bud Light marketing director at 3:10 is so clearly evil to me. She has that concentrated background of children's drawings behind her because she wants to apply emotional leverage to anyone that disagrees with her. I've seen her ilk in every HR department.

Ironically, the terms "freak, sissy and loser" are much more likely to be used by a certain "opposite sex" when insulting, demeaning and dehumanizing others that they find...............not suitable for courtship.

the director trying to dodge responsibility by blaming men "who were the real brains behind the operation" for the backlash to her garbage is just the *chef's kiss* muwahh perfect encapsulation of the modern female mind

The "evil businessman" trope - We saw that in the film "Joker" where our anti-hero is harassed and attacked late at night on the New York subway by a gang of... suited businessmen! 😂

Old commercial: "Take care of yourself. Raise a family. Be happy!" New commercial: "Flagellate yourself because it's become culturally acceptable for us to hate you for your intrinsic characteristics!"

I stopped buying Gillette since then myself. They lost me as a customer for mu entire life.

The Gillette commercial actually did wake me up. It was at the moment I realized that the MSM really was attacking masculinity. I’ve honestly not purchased a Gillette product since

As a nerd at school, the kindest classmates were jocks. Yep, the boys who were the kindest were the ones who channelled masculinity. The worst boys were usually the ones who seemed to lack masculinity.

It was a weird strategy to call your customers toxic a-holes.

I remember the casting process for this. A few people I knew went for roles in the boardroom. Black and Asian guys. None of them got the gig. When you look at the ethnic breakdown of the sequence, you can understand why.

Something else you can notice is that in the entire commercial, every single man depicted as "toxic" is white except one, and every man depicted as "reformed", "regretful" or "better" is non-white except one. It's WAY too obvious casting to be statistically insignificant, it's 100% on purpose.

most criminally underrated channel on this platform

I loved this advert. I show it to my twin sons, repeatedly chanting "Boys will be boys" on a loop as they savagely battle for the one BBQ burger for the day. Apparently that's illegal but, as the judge was about to hand out my sentence, I placed my hand on her shoulder and informed her of what she meant to say. In the following prison time, my cellmate demanded I use his Gillette shiv to make myself presentable in the showers for the other inmates (and Billy Eichner), who insisted I was about to receive the Best A Man Can Get. Progress people. Progress.

To this day in my household we haven’t bought one single Gillette product and it used to be my go to brand eve since I started shaving.

In 2019, when I was attending Mohawk College in Ontario for an Accounting diploma, my Marketing course actually had a discussion about this ad and the professor (A guy) was speaking positively about it and how it taps into social consciousness but I said in class that it was a poorly made ad by generalizing and insulting its target demographic. he simply told me "That's your opinion." I was floored. Maybe it's cause I am a Nigerian-immigrant but it just felt strange to see a western company actually attacking the very group they were trying to sell to. Needless to say, after class, many guys and a few ladies actually told me they agreed with me. I also never bought any Gillette products before and I never have since.

"a frame containing a painting of the wall behind it" got me good 🤣

as a little boy i was bullied and spat on by a group of older girls, i remember this well because i was crying the whole way home until my mother comforted me

For 20 years I had used only Gillette. I haven't bought a Gillette product since that ad was released.

tbh girls mostly get bullied by other girls and boys get bullied by other boys, I'm pretty sure many women (& men) can relate to this since people from same sex at times can understand each other while at the same time have there own egos about one another

This ad was the only time I've ever felt compelled to change my consumer purchasing habits - I have never purchased nor considered purchasing Gillette or Gillette-affiliated products since this episode.

"Grooming habits" are exactly what Gillette is all about in 2023.

The only thing that these ads teach me is the way people use images to subliminally make people think what they want for nefarious purposes. Honestly it helps me a lot to write evil propaganda for my story. And your breakdowns are simply amazing!

One thing I find hilarious is how the commercial goes out of it's way to portray men as basically being all the same, ignoring the fact that the type of people is championing are basically all the same, overweight individuals, usually with a lot of piercings, died and shaved hair, usually in their 20s and 30s, being borderline impossible to tell what gender they are. Truly is the pot calling the kettle black.

I get into fights with my cousin and my dad will cane me while my cousin got caned by his. NOT ONCE DID the "boys will be boys" crap exists in my life. He did really want me to be the best version of myself, and keep going. He always said I was a "fighter", beating cancer at 9 months old and he says it again while dealing with Parkinson's. I have my role models as well. Convoy, Kamen Rider and Ultraman will remind me of Truth, Justice and Beauty. In a way, my dad has been the Captain Muramatsu/Tobei Tachibana I've ever needed. He once told me, "Being a man doesn't mean to be macho and brash westerners you see from Hollywood, its a test of how strong AND disciplined you are in your beliefs, morals and compassion for others sake."

That "boys will be boys" thing after the boys wrestling around just kills me. I was almost a full blown girly girl and still played rough and wrestled with friends/siblings. It's a child thing. Lmao This commercial was wild. Can't believe I never saw it. 🤦

It's amazing how sexless they want society to be, especially when they consider women doing sexwork to be empowering. But I guess it makes sense in a twisted way. The accepted sexual outlets are the soulless options of onlyfans and prostitutes, because anything that inspires actual passion (meant in the broad sense, not just romantic/sexual) is something that could cause you to act against the system in defense/pursuit of it.

Ads actually used to be enjoyable and something you didn't mind watching. I got my first taste of American ads on VHS tapes that our local video club would tape cartoons onto from a dish. My favorite at the time was the Oreo ad with the two kids pulling it apart and going "BACHELORS" and high fiving before a pretty girl wanders past, smiles and they both go. "Let's do another one!"

Fun fact: children who don't engage in rough and tumble play are horrible at learning physical boundaries and developing empathy. It's entirely natural. Even in the animal kingdom, young cubs wrestle each other in what's called a 'play' fashion to also learn boundaries and to practice hunting. I absolutely loathe every woke company with their asinine views of the world.

We had Lady Speedstick commercials, they were allowed to show a happy, confident woman -a lara croft looking girl being a overall cool and confident, imagine if they went this route -showing off some sad, victim of home violence girl tattered with the message "Is this the best girls can be?" they'd be grinded into cuck feed

Amazing how they thought this was a good idea. I was a Gillette customer probably for life since they sent me a razor in the mail when I turned 18 and I remember thinking “wow” they were thinking about me and becoming a adult and they had me forever or so they thought. Once this ad dropped I threw it away after having that razor for over 20 years. I’ll never buy a Gillette again. Also now that my son is at the age of shaving I went out of my way to discourage him using Gillette.

The Gillette ad was a nuclear bomb for their reputation and sales in the northern hemisphere. One interesting thing about it is that in Latin america (I live in Peru), that comercial was NEVER aired in any media, it wasn't even translated to spanish/portuguese or adapted for the local market. Here Gillette kept their sales using local good looking men and local professional sports figures ( soccer and tennis players mainly) Also the commercial didn't appeared in the Gillette Latin America RU-vid channel at the time.

I'm female and that commercial 100% offended me!!!

Proud to say that when my eldest twin boys began to shave properly and I took them to buy their first proper razor, they said they didn’t want Gillette. Proud Co. Antrim Dad here 👍🏼

I haven’t seen that original Gillette advert for decades. It brought back so many positive and happy memories. When I saw it as a kid it was very inspiring. I feel so sorry for young lads these days, they don’t stand a chance.

I love just how well you not only attacked the idea behind the ad but also described a better way to make the ad with the message.

That was quite the in-debt analysis. A point missed by the new campaign appears to be that in the old "toxic" ads, women loved their men. It was basically: you do well and you shave, then you get a kiss by the one who loves you.

I was out of razor blades, in a vacation spot. Had to find razors. It took 3 stores to find razors that weren't Gillette. Every single one of my male relatives avoids Gillette products. I have one thing to say, to Gillette. Foxtrot Yankee.

Never forget what they think of you, your father, your son and your family and friends. Never forget, no matter how much they beg for forgiveness and bury their past. Never. Forget.

I love the systematic, long-form critiques you do, it's a great format, and very cathartic to people like me who have no platform and are endlessly frustrated watching our culture gnawed away at by these fucking termites. Your subscriber count is going up every day, you're going to be huge. Keep at it.

Never in my life have I heard anyone attempt to justify a sexual assault by saying, "Boys will be boys." Not once, not neva. No way.

I think the most ironic part of having Terry Crews in the commercial was that the kinds of people who liked the ad would have been people who would've berated Crews when he tried to speak out about his own abuse during MeToo. The guy is a genuine person and they're just trying to use that clip of him in a way that's honestly just awful.

Factually, Bud Light was the top-selling beer in the U.S. since 2001. How, then could it have been "in decline for a long time"?

As a man who was a real bullying victim those hollywood archetypes are disgusting. The women who write those pieces were busy sucking my bullies dry in high school, so they couldn't understand the real dynamics at play. They also didn't talk to me because the cool dudes didn't like me. Do you know what helps? Helahty male development. I trained martial arts, learned to deal with conflict, now I'm a BJJ and Muay Thai enthusiast lawyer who ABHOR people who abuse the weak. Decency and values, not weakness, are the cure to bullying.

Just one little addition- The Hypocrisy of 'The Male Gaze' has been going on a LONG time. Nearly 30 years ago, in the fall of 1993, when I was in College, our Dorm had its own workout room. Most days, after class, I would spend a couple hours exercising. At times the room would get fairly warm, because of the heat pipes that ran through it & I would often take off my shirt to be more comfortable. One night I finished my workout & on leaving the room came within an inch of colliding with a young woman. As soon as she saw me, her eyes went dinner-plate wide & she exclaimed, "Oh my God! You're HUGE!" Clearly meant as a compliment, I accepted it & left. But later as I thought about it, even then, three decades ago, I thought about what would have happened if the situation had been reversed. If I had exclaimed how hot some girl was that I nearly bumped into. In days my reputation as a creepy lecher would have been cemented in stone. In the CURRENT era, I might even end up getting expelled. I want to believe that most people know better than the kind of propaganda displayed in this ad, but the fact is, my Wife, who, when I married her 15 years ago, was a Smart, non-feminist lady, is now completely Woke. Despite not actually changing, I have gone from a Man she thought a great deal of, to a 'Selfish, Betraying, Sexist, Racist, Transphobe, Nazi.' Still, thanks for putting this analysis out there. I hope it helps someone, somewhere.

How exactly are we supposed to procreate if we don't go after a woman we find attractive?

I also haven't purchased Gillette since this add. Great video. I remember trying to articulate why it offended me so. You did a great job

I was a life long Gillette (P&G)customer, Also a life long Old Spice (P&G) customer… I have not purchased a single Proctor&Gamble (P&G) product since the commercial came out, not a single personal hygiene product of gyros, not a single drop of or item of cleaning supplies, no laundry detergent, no floor cleaning, no dish soap, not a single damn P&G product.

How times have changed... When I was a kid, bullying was considered just a way of life and you were encouraged to stand up for yourself.

Whenever I usually see this type of misandry, I usually wonder, "Who hurt you?" "What male figure let you down?" Or more to the point... What's the real issue (usually mental) that's bothering you? This level of hatred for men is so off the charts that isn't doesn't have any bearing in reality. It's almost on par with Incel hatred for women and couples. I just ask what is wrong with these people. I have to admit that men in the past and at times haven't been the best to women. But this is on far with "Birth of a Nation." I just see this or comments along the same wavelength (with either gender saying about the other) and know this person isn't sane.

Why do these marketing execs all think young people are universally pink haired gender studies majors?

The idea that gillette thought it was losing the younger generations despite the fact that young men still have to shave is just mind boggling. Beards may be in, but that shit still has to be cleaned up with a razor and clean shaven will return to fashion in time.

I think you've missed some of the symbolism of opening "close up face half in shadow". I believe it's trying to make the point that all men have a dark side that's hidden from view, as well as the "light" side they present to the public.

I liked the "subtle" use of red skull supervillain whenever you mentioned Gillette. You're really great at that stuff.

This is the equivalent of Nestle Making an Ad about protecting the water

I love that the sexist sitcom trope they use is something that hasn't been around for at least 20 years. Sums up modern activism, fighting ghosts and myths when they already won years ago.

As one cartoon put it, we went from subliminal: "girls like guys who shave" to superliminal: "BUY A RAZOR R__PIST!"

I took a break from binge watching the TV show Succession to view this because I couldn't get enough of watching men being portrayed as toxic, stupid, power-loving, narcissists. I'm already over the sister/ daughter in the show, 'Shiv', being portrayed as the only character who has any common sense and good ideas, but is constantly shut down and never given a chance purely because she's a woman. And of course, she's the only one in the family who is a total lefty. Great analysis mate. Spot on!

When I first came across the Despot, I couldn't conceive how he came up with such absolutely brilliant jokes. Woke Awards is one of the best examples of this genius on display. Yet, the more I watch his videos where he talks about film, history, and even breaks down videos such as this one with the surgical precision of an award winning film critic. Incredible insight in every video I've seen, and with better humor than you can find anywhere. As always, fantastic video!

I had been a "faithful" Gillette consumer for over 20 years, ever since young me grew a tiny bit of a stubble and my dad went with me to buy a razor and shaving cream, he picked Gillette products for me to use so I have just always used the brand since then, that is until that infamous ad came out. Now I go outof my way to pick some other products

As someone who only has to shave her legs, kudos for guys who stood up against this nonsense. This is what happens when you openly hate your customers. I wish more movies would learn this lesson.

two kids fighting in our house gets the ages old "give it up lads before someone ends up crying..." . which generally got ignored and 9 times out of 10 did end up with one of em in tears..

I still remember the ad, haven't bought a gillette product since

This genius piece of marketing has made me actively avoid buying all procter and gamble products. Truly the worst advertising a brand can get.

Once again, modern writers ripping up the achievements of those who went before them. Not creating, destroying. We see it in everything. It's exhausting. I instally stop buying/using any product from companies that do this.

There was a time in America when bankers and corporations would be *AFRAID* to berate and lecture working class men about morality and virtue. In fact, the entire concept was unimaginable. Now here we are.

I got to say, I'm loving the comments section on this video. So many women standing up for truth against this Gilette hit-piece. We're proud and we thank you.

How to collapse your company in a single day:

"...the woman that recently turned Bud Light into a synonym for brand suicide"... very well phrased!

You know, I don't think I have ever heard a man say, "Boys will be boys." It's always been older women who say it.

It's late October 2023 as of this writing. We have _still not bought a single Gillette product_ , which includes its female oriented products for my wife.

It's just crazy how far that company fell from grace. They actually sent me a mach 3 razor on my 18th birthday back in 2003, and I thought that marketing was brilliant since I used that thing up until the boycott. Never bite the hand that feeds you...

Oh come on, that was a great advert, I got so many messages of support because of it! From my non-Orthodox mates congratulating me on never shaving.

This was some S-Tier, scorched earth analysis Antrim, bravo 👊💪

This commercial convinced me to start using Walmart store brand razors which worked legitimately better at a fraction of the price.

Since that ad I never bought any Gillette product, and told my gf to not buy anything from that brand for me as well

Oh this brings back memories, I'm so glad that the company's burning

Day off of my internship - check. Despot posts a video - check The sun is shining - check Its a good day

"...clad in Satan's will made fabric..." Absolutely sublime.

I actually want to see a reaction from feminists about the old gillette ads and lets see what they're opinions are on that, if they really think that's "toxic masculinity" than it proves they're not doing any good for men and women and have no understanding what a respectful man is.

13:25 the odd part is that no, in reality it’s often homes with neglectful or absent fathers that produce bullies, but if we acknowledge that fact it starts to shine a light on where “toxic masculinity” really comes from.

Personally I think her words were an attempt at a self fulfilling prophecy. I'm not American, nor do I drink beer, but I've heard that Budlight was the top brand in the States BEFORE that marketing campaign. Also, I kept hearing about "Mc.Carthyism" so I went and looked it up. And, in all honesty considering the current state of the West...can you say it was really just a "scare"?

That Ad convinced me, that I need a cheap electric razor, and no, not a Braun... Never bought a single Gilette product, since and omitting Procter & Gamble products wherever possible. Good job, Marketing Team! 👍🏻

"They" know men built the world. And "they" fear men can destroy it.

Ironically Harry’s razors is equally as woke as Gillette. I assume most of your viewers are familiar with the daily wires boss Jeremy Boreing who has his own brand razors. I don’t know if they’re available in the UK but anyone who hasn’t seen the advert - you’re in for a treat