Axe: Objectifying Women for the Sake of Selling Body Spray

Have you ever had that  moment where you're sitting watching TV with your family and a super awkward commercial comes on? I'm talking about watching the Broncos game with your dad and a Viagra commercial comes on kind of awkward.

Well, personally, that's how I feel whenever an Axe commercial comes on. I'm uncomfortable when an Axe advertisement comes on my screen when I'm by myself...but it's even worse when there's men and boys in the room with me.

In case you aren't familiar with Axe commercials, they basically all have the same premise involving a heterosexual male (most often white) becoming more appealing to women with the use of the product, whether it be hair care, deodorant, or body spray.
Although it has used different story lines in its ads over the years, Axe always plays on the assumption that women are possessions to be gained and achieve status. Women are there for men's pleasure and self-confidence. Even an average looking man with an average body becomes irresistible to the sexiest women when he wears Axe.

I won't explain every little sexist detail I find in Axe commercials, only because that is not the goal of this post. It's true that as a woman, I find such advertisements offensive, uncomfortable, and alarming on behalf of females everywhere. However, it doesn't really matter what I think about these ads, because I'm not the target audience for Axe...I'm not the one buying the products.

Based on the products sold and the content of the commercials, Axe targets 18-24 year old heterosexual males. Since this is a very prominent group in society, I think it's safe to say Axe is not concerned with multicultural advertising. If it was, these commercials would appeal to non-white minorities and women.

Axe crafts its marketing messages based on the audience it is trying to sell its products to. The company uses language and cultural references/awareness of the way things are to sell not just a product, but also assimilation to cultural norms that can only be achieved using Axe.
In this specific case, the norm Axe is promoting is a heterosexual male desire to attract women (potential sexual partners). But the way Axe does this is through images and language that integrate the target audience's desire to be desired. Playing on the cultural belief that men must attract women, and attempting to exploit insecurities of men that they may not be attractive enough to females.

So Axe commercials and advertisements may be offensive and distasteful to a part of the female population that feels objectified by them...but to Axe that doesn't completely matter because its not looking for approval of a multicultural audience anyways.