Venus “Women are from Venus and men are from Mars”, an old saying indicating the different gender roles assigned to each sex. Advertisements can greatly influence people’s perception of these gender roles by either promoting them or altering them. Regardless, many advertisements today tend to keep women confined to their gender roles, which “tells women that their role in life is to be sexually attractive to men” (Maasik and Solomon 562). In Venus’ advertisement for its new product, the “Embrace,” women are encouraged to accept the gender code and exert it as a form of empowerment. In the advertisement for Venus’ new shaving razor, the “Embrace”, a young white couple is shown being intimate with each other at a beach. The female is blonde, slender, and physically very attractive and is sporting a provocative blue two piece bikini. She is being carried by the man who is lean, has short dark hair and wearing tan khaki shorts with his face away from the camera. Her arms are positioned around his neck and her legs tightly latched on around his waist. They are gazing directly into each other’s eyes and in the moment, very happy. To the right of this image is a picture of the product itself and the words “Goddess of Never Letting Go” and the Venus trademark with the words “Reveal the Goddess in You” below it.
At first glance, the woman in the ad seems to fit the description of the “Man’s Woman” (Craig 206) perfectly in that she is “physically attractive, slim, young and white, blond, and dressed in revealing clothing” (Craig 207). This may look demeaning initially, however, through deeper analysis this can be seen as a form of post feminism. Post feminists believe that “being proud of her body and using it to get what she wants is part of a woman’s empowerment” (Maasik and Solomon 562). Therefore a woman being able to use her feminine features in order to get what