I was driving up one of the roads in West Amman and it was lined with advertising for a company that has just re-branded. I was reading them as we drove and slowly started to get annoyed and then just got mad in the end. What I saw appalled me and was very disturbing. 

The ads were a series of six three representing men and three representing women. The ones representing men including lines like, this is my band, this is my chart, this is my fast track. Where as the ones with women had the lines this is my mirror, this is my perfume bottle and this is my jewelry box.

I could not believe it! I was fuming. This is a disgusting blatant display of misogynistic, gender discriminatory, poorly thought out advertising campaign. How they expect to win new female clientele to their business or appeal to them is beyond me. I find that these things do not in anyway represent the modern Jordanian woman, who is educated, works, supports herself and her family even, is independent and is a lot more than a mirror, a perfume bottle or a jewelry box! 

Why they chose those items to represent women is beyond me. The fact that none of these messages revolve around education, careers or even family is appalling, to say the least. The fact that men are represent through careers, hobbies and ambition speaks volumes about the way this company views half the society and how they interpret their role.

I think that the images and messages should be gender sensitive and empowering not derogatory or demeaning to the various roles of women. And they should also show men in similar situations and not highlight such traditional stereotypical roles that are no longer applicable today in the year 2007!

I hope that this company rethinks their new campaign, and quickly,  before alienating some of their target audience with the nonsense messages they are sending out to the public.