Be Stupid: Diesel Ad Campaign

The ad I decided to feature is from Diesel’s 2010 Be Stupid campaign. The campaign consists of various print ads including images of young people doing “stupid” things beside slogans like “Smart Critiques. Stupid Creates” and “Smart Says No. Stupid Says Yes.” The idea behind the campaign was to redefine the word “stupid” to mean brave, rebellious and creative in an attempt to have people identify with this entity and to the brand. In other words, if you can relate to the ads you will feel that this brand of clothing will make the kind of jeans someone like you will want to wear (an advertising strategy used to build connections between the brand and their consumers).

The appeal to this campaign is the carefree and fun tone behind it. You can tell that this ad is targeted to young people who would most likely find this humorous and light-hearted. But not just young people; the ads were primarily featured in women/fashion magazines including Grazia, Dazed and Confused and Nylon. For women who consider themselves fashion forward individuals with urban, out-of-the-norm styles this ad could be very appealing. The ad is displaying a young woman who is comfortable with herself, dressed in cool clothes and doing something that requires having “balls”, as the text implies. For a sub-culture of women wanting to deviate from the ordinary, the version of stupid that Diesel portrays is liberating and intriguing. Even the waves caused by the controversy of the ad can be appealing to brand supporters. According to The Guardian, although the campaign “won a top award at the Cannes advertising festival [it was] banned by the UK ad watchdog for being offensive and encouraging antisocial behavior.” The Advertising Standards Authority decided to clear the ads to run in magazines but not in posters because they would be an “untargeted medium” that was “likely to be seen by children and cause serious or widespread offense” (The Guardian).

Essentially, the purpose of this ad was to be controversial and therefore be appealing to strong women who feel they are in control of their bodies and style. Diesel backed this up by stating that the image displayed "a very strong and unexpected image of femininity," that the woman on the ladder was shown in a "non-exploitative way and that the message tackled society's pre-occupation with 24/7 camera surveillance in a light and non-threatening way" (The Guardian). However, it’s interesting to see that it’s a woman exhibiting the “explicit” and sexual behavior found in this ad. Although the ad references a male body part (balls), it’s definitely not a man on the ladder pulling his pants down in front of the camera. In a sense the ad is objectifying women to sell a product and through the process is also contributing to the set concepts about womanliness (Kirk and Okazawa-Rey 208). According to the way our society is constructed, it makes perfect sense to have a sexy girl flashing her boobs because women are the sexual objects, not men. 

It’s also ironic that Diesel considers this ad to be an “unexpected image of femininity” when the woman in the ad is young, has a perfect body, shiny hair and fashionable clothes—nothing unexpected about that. She looks just as perfect as all the women found in advertisements used to set up the beauty ideal that keeps women and girls in line (lean, tall, young, white, heterosexual, flawless skin etc.) (Kirk and Okazawa-Rey 208).

Word count: 497

Works Cited:

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. Women’s Lives: Multicultural Perspectives 4th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2007.

Sweney, Mark. "Award-winning Diesel Campaign Banned by ASA.” Guardian.co.uk. The Guardian, 30 June 2010. Web. 11 Oct. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/30/diesel-asa-advertising>.