Braun has been labelled ‘irresponsible’ and ‘immoral’ by critics in a backlash against the brand using a trans model with surgical scars in an advert for men’s trimmers.
The ‘contentious’ advert simply depicted a trans model topless, using Braun’s ‘The Series X Hybrid Trimmers for men’, with visible surgical scars from an apparent double mastectomy operation.
Yet critics have claimed the creatives breach the Advertising Standards Authority guidelines, which allegedly bans the use of “glamorising” or “trivialising” cosmetic surgery.
The advertising watchdog states, “Marketers should take care not to trivialise the decision to have cosmetic surgery.
“Procedures should always be portrayed as something that requires time and thought and should never be portrayed as ‘safe’, ‘easy’ or ‘risk-free’.”
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“Promoting the removal of healthy breast tissue is not only shockingly immoral but against advertising standards guidance to not glamorize or trivialise cosmetic surgery,” said Sex Matters executive director, Maya Forstater, to the Telegraph about the Procter & Gamble-owned brand.
“The campaign perpetuates the terrible lie that women can become men if they have their breasts removed and take hormones.
Forstater added, “Braun executives must have been living under a rock if they think that this campaign represents ‘inclusivity’.”
Thoughtful Therapist – a group of psychologists who claim to be concerned with the impact of gender ideology among young people – co-founder, James Esses added:
“Once again, we find a private corporation willing to glorify irreversible surgery being performed on the healthy breasts of women, in pure pursuit of profit.
“This is mindless, irresponsible, virtue-signalling, woke capitalism at its most dangerous”.
Braun’s predicament is reminiscent of the backlash the American beer brand Bud Light received from more conservative and transphobic consumers, following a promotional post with famous trans influencer, Dylan Mulvaney.
Yet it was the AB InBev-owned brand’s vague statement neither supporting nor apologising to Mulvaney that caused an additional backlash from pro-LGBTQ+ supporters – a move that marketers and employees alike believe has caused a “quasi-permanent” sales slump, and ‘consumers to be lost forever’.
Costa Coffee faced a similar critical response earlier this year, over a cartoon ad of a trans man after a double mastectomy.
The creative went viral on social media with the hashtag, #BoycottCostaCoffee, trending.
Marketing Beat has contacted Braun for comment.
