Vous êtes sur la page 1sur 2

The new Nescafe commercial really bothered me.

It started out with a


feel-good vibe focusing on the young mom and wife supposedly fulfilling a
whole load of social roles (that are all happening within the domestic sphere
by the way), and finally ending with a tagline that made me slap my
forehead in dismay: “Ang pangarap ko ay matupad ang mga pangarap nila.”
(The central female figure in the ad of course said this as she watched her
entire family go off to school and work while she stayed behind to tend to
household matters.)

I looked down on the cup of coffee I was savouring up until that


unfortunate moment when the implications imbedded in the tagline hit me. I
put the coffee down with a weary shake of my head and proceeded to take
the commercial apart in my mind.

Unfortunately, since the Spanish period, women in the Philippine


society have been assigned specific roles, behaviours, functions and even
way of thinking that are deemed to be acceptable within standard norms. If
the woman would delineate from these “pre-ordained” social roles and
behaviour, then she would be branded as a “bad”, “bitchy”, “eccentric”,
“zany” or even as an “immoral” woman who should be shunned and
ostracized. This is the harsh reality that women had to live by.

However, the modern period and especially the rise of Feminism have
somewhat alleviated the female condition. Finally, women began to fight for
their rights and little by little society began to recognize the inherent rights
of women to decide for themselves, to vote, to engage in intellectual
discourses, to be heard and to assert what they want to happen in their lives.
Yet, we still need to ask the question: have women truly come of age as a
social group, or are they enjoying these so-called “liberties” because the
world they live in has “allowed” them to do so?

Women only have to look around them in order to realize that they still
live in a society that is still male-dominated, and yes, women were given
“freedom” (can we really call it that?) but only to a certain extent. It is
through subtle manipulation that women are still being “socialized” into
accepting and fulfilling the roles assigned to them since time immemorial.
The Nescafe commercial is an example of how this is still happening today.
Analyze the latent message behind this ad and you will see that it is telling
women that their sole purpose in life is to live for their family and to serve
their family, for it is only by doing this that a woman would find fulfilment as
an individual. “My dream is the realization of their dream.” (Ang pangarap ko
ay matupad ang mga pangarap nila .) Are we to become domestic slaves,
foregoing our individuality and our dreams? Does society expect us to
sacrifice our hopes for the stability of the family without even as much
demanding the same commitment from men? Where is the equality in this?
Where is the recognition of our rights as women, as humans? And why is this
thought being promulgated?

It is all right to become a mother and a wife, there is nothing wrong


with that, but there is more to a woman than just being a wife or being a
mother. Our lives should not just revolve around these two facets of our
existence. We are our own being, we have our own dreams, we have our
aspirations, and yes our families can make us happy, but they are not the
sole source of our happiness. We should not be imprisoned within the
confines of domestic “bliss” and “satisfaction” that ads like Nescafe is
propagating. Simone De Beauvoir is right when she said that we should
transcend; we must go beyond the roles that have been given to us; we must
challenge ourselves to become better individuals, simply because we are
women --- we live, we love, we laugh --- and most of all --- we think.

Vous aimerez peut-être aussi