HAVE you seen those terrible Dev and Dale ads? They make us dairy farmers look like a bunch of dills.
Not only that, everyone will think we're all as ugly as them.
Don' t you think they should be banned?
Len, Loch
Dear Len,
You want to complain about stereotypes in advertising? Join the queue.
Farmers aren't the only ones to suffer from an image problem.
If you believed the ads, all tradies are overweigh ute-driving beer-guzzling yobbos, used car salesmen are dishonest, sleazy, try-hards and all politicians are egocentric opportunists serving only long enough to get the parliamentary pension - oh, hang on, that one is accurate.
Then you've got your gender stereotypes: all men are dopes in the kitchen unless they are chefs, and then they are posers or swear a lot. Women do all the shopping and cooking - oh, hang on, that one is accurate too.
Yes, they could have had a young, hunky six-foot dairy farmer dude drinking milk that spills down his bare chest, but would that have been any better? (OK girls, I know, silly question.)
But it would have been no more real than Dev and Dale.
I wouldn't worry too much. Most people understand it's not reality. It's how it sells the product that counts. Portraying farmers sitting at their computers poring over spreadsheets is more realistic, but is it likely to sell more cheese? I don't think so.
Really, the most important rule the advertising team needs to remember is the characters should always look hot - less Dev and Dale and more Chippendales.
