While looking in Joanne’s scrapbook a came across this letter from a friend, Tom discussing his views on Jo’s current feminist publications. I like his insight on how he views men and women as “fundamentally equal”, this was honestly shocking to me because given the time period and the history surrounding it, I was not expecting to see this reaction from someone, especially a man in the scrapbook. All of the answers provided made me happy, knowing that even around the 1970’s not ALL the men had sexist views on marriage and social roles. In terms of role reversal and the idea of marriage being equal, like “a friendship” that Tom described in the letter made me think of a particular campaign called “Share the Load”. Ariel, a laundry company owned by major corporation
Procter and Gamble created this campaign in order to challenge the preconceive views on gender roles in the household. “Share the Load” challenges the idea that doing laundry and other gender specific roles is only for the women to perform, but in reality this shouldn’t be the case. This commercial resonates with me on a deep level because I love the idea behind challenge preconceived gender roles. I believe that marriage and household task should be equal and shared, not one gender should have to perform as task or a job just because of the gender they identify with. This commercial is very emotional, because in the perspective of a man who is apologizing to his daughter for not helping her mother around the house and passing on future stereotypes and attitudes on to her regarding household dynamics. The apology is very sincere and realistic because I know that my own dad feels the same way, he showed my sisters and I that laundry, making dinner, taking care of the kids is a women’s job. It wasn’t until recently he apologized to me, by working in collaboration with the “Share the Load” campaign.