Anti-Drunk Driving Campaign Under Fire for Being Sexist
“So TN only values women who are super attractive, keep their mouth shut, and keep their distance. Classy.” (Photo: @VoteGloriaJ/ Twitter)
“Buy a drink for a marginally good-looking girl, only to find out she’s chatty, clingy and your boss’s daughter.”
No, this isn’t the summary of the latest idiotic bro comedy. It’s a slogan from a now-defunct anti-drunk driving campaign implemented by the Tennessee Governor’s Highway Safety Office.
Went another: “After a few drinks the girls look hotter and the music sounds better. Just remember: If your judgment is impaired, so is your driving.”
The initiative involved the distribution of flyers and coasters with the slogans to bars throughout the state.
“My first reaction was cool, we got free coasters,“ said one 25-year-old waitress and bartender at Charlie Bob’s, of her initial response to the campaign. “But then one of my customers pointed out what was on them, and my jaw dropped.”
The campaign also included a graffiti campaign called “Legends of the Stall,” which included a cartoon depicting the story of one drunken young man who is relieved to find he didn’t drink and drive – and also didn’t drink so much that he accidentally slept with a “creepy older women” who got “lucky.” The cartoon ends on a cliffhanger as the man realizes that wait, maybe he did.
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When public outcry about the offensiveness and misogynist tone of the campaign mounted, the Governor’s office responded by issuing a statement defending the content of the campaign by saying that the campaign was never intended “to offend anyone. This new initiative was designed to reach the young male demographic, who are statistically more likely to drive under the influence. Well-known adages, like dating the boss’s daughter, were used to grab their attention within the bar environment.”
This answer wasn’t good enough for many, including State Rep. John Ray Clemmons (D-Nashville), who said of the campaign in a statement, “It is not only offensive, but it is also inexcusable and a waste of taxpayer dollars.”
And experts agree.
“Wow. What a misguided campaign,” says Sharyn Potter, PhD, MPH, and the Co-Director and an Associate Professor of Sociology at the Prevention Innovations Research Center at the University of New Hampshire and an expert in bystander culture. “Beyond missing the point about how friends can and do intervene when their friends are too impaired to drive I do not know how a campaign that denigrates women will be effective at reducing drunk driving. Further the campaign perpetuates the larger cultural attitudes that objectify women and reiterate that a woman’s value is only based on her attractiveness.”
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