Deodorant Ad's Powerful Message Might Make You Cry

Maggie Parker
The new ad highlights the stress transpeople can experience while using the restroom. (Photo: Stocksy)
The new ad highlights the stress transpeople can experience while using the restroom. (Photo: Stocksy)

While it seems the entire country can’t quite figure this out, a beauty brand has nailed it: There is no right or wrong way to express gender.

Secret’s new deodorant commercial featuring a trans or gender-queer person will bring tears to your eyes, and a little hope to your heart.

The latest addition to the Secret #StressTest ad campaign addresses the anxiety transgender people face navigating restrooms, which is a lot worse lately thanks to a number of anti-transgender bathroom bills in different states across America, like North Carolina’s House Bill 2.

The commercial opens with a bunch of young women entering a bathroom and chatting by the mirror, and then pans to a trans or genderqueer woman in the stall, waiting to come out. Trying to muster up courage can make a girl sweat, so that’s where Secret comes in. But the deodorant brand doesn’t really try to play up the sweat, they beautifully let it sell itself, focusing on the real issue.

As she paces the stall trying to muster up the courage to exit and face the other women, Secret sheds light on the difficulties trans people face in the littlest and most mundane activities. Though she says nothing, it leaves the viewers, no matter what their gender identity, with knots in their stomachs.

“Stress test #8260,” the text that shows up on screen reads as the woman takes a deep breath and opens the door. “Dana finds the courage to show there’s no wrong way to be a woman,” it says.

“I always have moments of insecurity but I have conditioned myself to act unbothered,” Karis Wilde, who plays Dana, shared with Queerty when asked if she can relate to the scene. “While shooting, I allowed myself to feel vulnerable. It terrified me how much I’ve stored all those emotions; I almost cried in the middle of taping.”

The reactions to the #StressTest campaign haven’t been completely positive so far. In May, their commercial asking why women can’t propose to their significant others, featuring a hetero couple, blew up in their face. Some Twitter users accused the video of being heteronormative and isolating women who aren’t straight, while others said the message is sexist in assuming that women don’t already propose. However, the reaction to their newest commercial has been positive.

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