Gillette and the rise of woke capitalism | 15 January 2019

The politicisation of consumer products is one of the weirder developments of recent years. First, Oreos came out in support of gay rights. Then Nike extolled us to ‘believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything’, in its multimillion-dollar campaign with controversial former NFL star Colin Kaepernick. Now Gillette has launched a new advert calling on men to be ‘the best men can be’ and shed the nefarious habits of ‘toxic masculinity’ in the wake of the #MeToo movement.

The two-minute advert-come-public service announcement argues that men, in the words of actor Terry Crews, taken from his testimony on #MeToo in the US congress, should hold one another accountable for their behaviour. The clip shows some boys trying to hit each other at a barbecue, while their dads look on, tongs in hand, saying ‘boys will be boys’. A sitcom character ogles and grabs a woman, while blokes in the studio audience jeer in support.