A woman is judged at every instance irrespective of her dress, her complexion and her body type. Sexist and offensive remarks in advertisements often go unnoticed but this time around a Sri Lankan gym did the unthinkable when it compared women to a barrel. A shocking billboard put up by a gym in Colombo, Sri Lanka, featured a barrel next to a caption that read, “ This is no shape for a woman.” Apparently, they might have thought this will provoke women to take up memberships but they did not realize that this will receive a ton of backlash and flak on social media by netizens alike. The ad is making people fume with disgust and in anger over the sexist ad.
Every day when we log on to social media we get to hear instances of body shaming and women being slut-shamed. It is not only sexual harassment, crime, violence that plagues and hounds women around the world but also lurid remarks, eve teasing, and body shaming. The controversial hoarding of OSMO Fitness made people on social media seeth with anger and stirred up a huge storm online. Photos of the billboard started doing the rounds of the internet and people slammed the gym for such a sexist and distasteful advertisement. Bata Pakistan Issues Public Apology After Receiving Severe Criticism For Its Sexist Advertisement
The distasteful advertisement by OSMO Fitness
Sample a few tweets from the Twitter users
A new level of body shaming
Body-Shaming women
Being fit should be the goal
Hopefully no women will join the gym
Sri Lankan women take on body shaming
Barrel ladies
Disgusting ad
The Sri Lankan people’s hue-and-cry reached Deputy Minister of National Policies and Economic Affairs, Harsha de Silva, who intervened and asserted on Twitter that he would not tolerate such a sexist ad in Kotte. The banner was later covered by a black cloth overnight.
Sexism will not be tolerated
Sexist ads have been taken down
No space for Sexism
Bravo to determination
Achieve what is right
Women should be healthy
Osmo later apologized and clarified that the advertisement was not intended to degrade, offend or insult anyone and as reported by Daily Star the ad has been withdrawn and removed.