Apple’s iMac gets Blasted
The Newest Ad From Apple Evokes Anorexic Mindset
TV screens are being sold with the phrase that fuels people with eating disorders
Controversy sparks again as Apple reveals its new ad campaign. The slogan at the top of the ad reads, “The New iMac. You can’t be too thin. Or too powerful.” Below are the flat screen TV’s referred to.
Again, here is an ad that clearly combines the famous saying, “You can never be too rich or too thin” and uses it to indicate a flat screen TV.
While talking about computer and TV screens as being flat is a given for technology giants, mixing the saying with a motto people noticeably use in pro-eating disorder communities, is a nasty and irresponsible move.
Granted, Apple will gain press and media coverage as people who have gone through an eating disorder speak out. This probably benefits the company more than anything, which is probably why they choose to attempt these touchy subjects.
But it doesn’t make them okay. Eating disorders are not a joke and the people who are impacted by them usually aren’t laughing. Jesting at such devastating disorders is another way for those enmeshed in them to feel shameful for their behavior and gives them less of a reason to seek help.
Bloggers all over the Internet are outraged over this tasteless ad. One gal put it bluntly: "News flash to Steve Jobs and his marketing department: You sure as hell can be too thin. Your hair can fall out. You can be cold all the time. Your heart can slow down. You can become psychotic on the subject of food. In fact, you can be possessed by an illness so powerful that it actually causes you to violate the most basic human instinct: self-preservation" (Huntington Post, 2007).
There is an archive thread over at macenstein that has commenters guessing how long it’ll be before Apple is forced to pull the ad and apologize to the public. Some say 48 hours, some say 12, some say it won’t last until tomorrow.
There are others, though, that don’t see the big deal. From comments like Josh saying, “Oh shut up, honestly, grow up people,” to neolycan remarking, “I think having the computers in the ad should tell someone they are talking about computers, and not people… Seriously, people are harping on the fact Apple has a phrase that some people may take negatively, but so many ad’s, movies, tv shows, websites have rather skinny women and men in them” (macenstein forum, 2007).
Whether the ad gets pulled or not, it’s a message women hear far too often in the mass media: thin is in. How can we fight these huge companies? By building a society with strong enough individuals that slogans like that mean the company loses a mass amount of revenue and people shop somewhere else.
There’s no other way to fight these corporations than the let them know their ill-chosen campaigns will cost them money.
