Gillette: Is that the best you can get?

Gillette released a virtue-signaling ad on Monday that’s garnering plenty of buzz: It offers mixed, harmful messages to boys and men about sexual assault, bullying, and what it means to “be the best a man can get.”

The ad begins with a montage of guilty-looking men, boys bullying other boys, and men making light of other men catcalling women. Then there are snippets of the nightly news discussing allegations of sexual assault to add to the sound of guilt, frustration, and negativity. Then slowly there’s a shift: A young man stops another from pursuing an attractive young woman, adults interrupt fights between two young boys, and quarreling is quelled. While the ad ends on a positive note, encouraging boys not to bully each other or sexualize women, the premise itself, mixed seamlessly into the message of inspiration, is where the ad goes wrong.

The premise of the ad is that men are innately predatory, that boys are naturally bullies, and that masculinity is inherently toxic, wrong, or bad. It basically introduces young men to the rite of passage of shaving through the lens of guilt, assumption, and the worst side of humanity. If Gillette wanted to go that route, why not praise law enforcement and members of the military, who are predominantly male, rather than imply men are born as potential criminals?

Whether a father stops bullying and a young man encourages a peer not to catcall a pretty woman, or whether a man runs into a burning building or goes away to war to preserve liberty at home, these are healthy demonstrations of “the best a man can get,” not deviations from normal behavior that includes being a sexual predator, bully, or criminal.

It’s not only wrong to insinuate that all boys will become sexual predators and bullies, as if the two are even equal, but in doing so, Gillette virtue-signals more than it sells razors in this ad. This is not a good look for a company and an even worse message to our boys who should be loved, cherished, and guided through puberty and beyond — not beaten over the head with a presumptive, jaded message that masculinity is innately harmful to men and women alike.

Nicole Russell (@russell_nm) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota.