The Things that "Mad Men" Can Teach You...

Over this course, I have started watching the television series "Mad Men". It is a show about advertising agents in New York City during the ever changing social and civil rights movements in gender and race of the 1960s (amazing historical accuracy). On the DVD set for the series, as well as seen around online, is an advertisement for Clorox with special emphasis on Mad Men and the type of men who they were. Portrayed in the show, they were Men's men, they were wealthy, philandering, and had a family in the suburbs, with no consequences for their actions, as shown here by Clorox - everything can be "taken care of".

The tag line used on this ad is, "Getting ad guys out of hot water for generations"

So how does this connect to this course? My first thoughts went to Roland Barthes and his essay titled "Soap-powders and Detergents". One, for the obvious reason that it is an ad for Clorox, a very powerful and harsh cleaning detergent. This ad is obviously stating that bleach is the way to get your whites, white. Second, it plays very heavily on the concept of what exactly they are cleaning, or hiding. The lipstick on the collar implies that Ad men are cheating on their wives, and what better way to hide that than to destroy the evidence with Clorox bleach.

The essay discusses the psychology and psycho-analysis of the detergents. "The product 'kills' the dirt... their function is keeping public order not making war." I believe this applies to relationships in context of the advertisement. The bleach is "killing" the evidence of the "dirt" - the indiscretion. The function of keeping peace, not war, is hiding the evidence from the wife. Another area that the ad plays into is that the detergent "bases its prestige on the evidence of a result; it calls into play vanity, a social concern with appearances..." Keeping up appearances is very important within our society, especially among married couples, not wanting others thinking that your relationship is failing or that you can't keep your man in line.

(Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. Hill and Wang, 1972. Print.)