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Stop Freaking Out Over the Gillette Ad, Please! 

The ‘Gillette’ ad that caused massive outrage. Still trying to figure out why.  

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Dont be a jerk, Gillette is pleading in its latest advertisement. Let go of the cruel garb of ‘masculine’ deliverances and set an example for your lot out there because “the boys of today will be the men of tomorrow”.

One would think this isn’t really as renegade a message. This IS the moral protocol post the MeToo Movement, right? Um, no.

Not for some. This made some men REALLY angry. Phew.

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If you are among the ones whom the Gillette ad didn’t offend, do raise this exhausting question with me: Why do some men feel like their b*lls have been shaved off every time we start a sentence with “Why do men... ?”

Fragile Razor-Company Boycotters, is this really the hill you want to die on? I mean, you guys have already dug out those graves for yourself, but even a warped conscience looks at a mirror for upkeep.
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Anyway, first of all, stop freaking out.

It is 2019 and it is just not okay anymore to behave like a troubled caveman who was poked with a twig. If you feel emasculated, you want to boycott/give up on Gillette razors, and maybe grow out the oh-so-manly beard... please go ahead.

Here’s the deal — Gillette couldn’t care less. It’s probably scoffing in glee, while snorting in the wads of cash made at your expense. 

I could be wrong, maybe this brand really cares or maybe it doesn’t — given the consumerist wave of the call-out culture we are all perched on — but the point is this:

It is an advertisement. Not The Last Judgment. And we aren’t hating on all men — it is just that some of you have set a pretty damaging precedent.
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Gillette is selling you the same old razor but with a different message — something it should have done ages back. But it is never too late!

Don’t worry though, the razor is still riddled with problematic implications of masculinity, given your nuclear response. A product you use no longer stands for what you thought it did. You lose your calm, lickety-split!

Imagine how you guys would react to bigger things like, um, your idea of consent? Oh well, MeToo imagined it for us. Never mind.

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It is almost as if one fine day these men were informed that Santa doesn’t exist, real-world kindness does. Can you hear combusting egos?

So your razor now stands for respect, sympathy, and a clear idea of ‘consent’. Is that really so unjust a change?

Suck it up.

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Choose better battles to fight, once you’ve recovered from the debilitating knowledge of the oppressive regimes that have been in power for years now.

Take down patriarchy, one thought at a time, not a goddamn razor, please!

Meanwhile, we women will be busy peeling layers off the mirror that has told us — for all of history — to look and behave a certain way.

Thank you very much.

(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)

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