The giant clothing brand’s latest kids ad has angered a lot of people.
Some days it seems as though we have come quite far in terms of sexism. Gender-neutral toys and clothing are becoming more popular every day, proving that a child’s likes and dislikes should not be based on their gender.
But then an ad like this comes along.
The ad features new boys and girls clothing collections and unfortunately there was a glaring difference between the two.
Just…no. @LetToysBeToys @EverydaySexism pic.twitter.com/qWZfYhy6Bg
— Andrew D Wilson is now @adw.bsky.social (@PsychScientists) July 31, 2016
The boy is a ‘little scholar’, wearing a shirt with scientist Albert Einstein on the front, it is even captioned with ‘your future starts here’, a positive message for young boys.
Then there’s the little girl, in her sequined cat ears, branded as a social butterfly, without a caption like the one the boy got.
This ad, which was sent out as an email to a mailing list seems to imply that boys are expected to be academic while girls are seen as sociable.
Unsurprisingly people took offence to the ad and many took to twitter to rant about it.
https://twitter.com/SarahKate26/status/760357745610457088
Thinking @UKGap should swap social butterfly for literary badass for alternative aspirations for girls. Maybe I'll mock one up.
— Sam Missingham (@samatlounge) August 1, 2016
What on earth… @UKGap @Gap?!!! Talk about some class A sexist stereotyping, aimed at kids. Very disappointing. pic.twitter.com/rQJtxIh2UP
— Tina (@tinateeto) August 1, 2016
Absolutely incredible. It's 2016, we have a skills & productivity crisis & @UKGap is perpetuating gender stereotypes https://t.co/bResWyUSUb
— Chi Onwurah 💙 (@ChiOnwurah) July 31, 2016
As if blatant gender stereotyping isn’t shocking enough, people also noticed another huge problem with the ad. The ‘little scholar’s’ Einstein t-shirt is spelt wrong.
Did no one on the GAP team think this campaign through?
They've also managed to spell Einstein wrong…which is beautifully ironic https://t.co/j7fXEsLLmf
— Conor Collins (@conartworks) August 2, 2016
