Beauty brand LUX brought to life its commitment to supporting women against everyday sexism in April by teaming up with Volleyball South Africa at the Durban Open on an initiative called ‘Change The Angle’ which set out to start a conversation in the sports media about sexist camera angles.
The Unilever brand worked with agency Wunderman Thompson Singapore and sports broadcaster SABC to leverage to highlight how media coverage of female athletes in competition still focuses far too often on female anatomy rather than sporting achievements via invasive angles and excessive close up shots.
By highlighting how such sexist coverage devalues sporting empowerment and seeking to start a conversation with broadcasters and audiences, the initiative aims to flip the male gaze back on itself and encourage them to ‘Change The Angle’.
As well as teaming up officially with Volleyball SA, LUX also partnered with a team of elite female athletes, as well as sports commentators and officials with a focus on the 15 and 16 April Durban Open tournament organised by the South African Volleyball Association.
The event, which featured eight of South Africa’s top women beach volleyball stars, was broadcast live by SABC reaching an estimated audience of around 20m in South Africa.
The female players wore QR codes on specific parts of their bodies – the very same areas that sports broadcasters so often focus on – and, when scanned, these codes direct viewers to the project’s hero online film which sees LUX and its line-up of leading sportswomen call on broadcasters and camera operators to ‘Change The Angle’ of how female athletes are portrayed. Urging them to focus on their sporting skills and strengths rather than their physical attributes.
The video highlights recent statistics about sexist sports coverage which found more than ‘2500 pictures objectifying women’ were published at the 2021 Olympic Games and includes powerful statements from female sports stars.
The spot, which was called ‘Change The Angle – Hey Camera’ and which dropped on 15 April, closes with a set of six best practice tips for the media on how female athletes should be portrayed.
The focus on beach volleyball was a strategic choice informed by research showing that the sport suffers more than most from ‘baked-in bias’ due to being played under hot conditions and in minimal clothing.
But the brand acknowledges that the problem affects all sports globally.
The campaign’s sports influencer ambassadors included cricket commentator Kass Naidoo, netball star Bongi Msomi, plus model and Miss Universe 2019 Zozibini Tunzi who all use their own online channels and real world influence to further spread the QR code and its underlying message.
‘Change The Angle’ aims to create awareness and drive change by highlighting the issue and putting pressure on broadcasters to change the camera gaze with actionable guidelines.
The initiative reflects the LUX brand belief that objectification of women diminishes their achievements and undermines confidence and reinforces its commitment to support women against everyday sexism and promote beauty as a source of strength rather than objectification.
“Women in sports are 10 times more likely to be objectified by camera angles that focus on certain body parts compared to their male counterparts. When we found out that this is also an issue for top female athletes who have achieved incredible things, we knew we had to act,” said LUX Global Brand VP Severine Vauleon, “This doesn’t only devalue the female athletes’ professional performance and achievements, but also perpetuates the objectification issue many women face every day. At LUX, we believe that beauty should be a source of strength, and that the focus should be on celebrating the beauty of their strength, skills and achievements in sport.”
“LUX has been fighting against everyday sexism for years now. Wherever it shows up” explained Global CCO at Wunderman Thompson Bas Korsten. “The media and specifically sports media have been contributing to the objectification of women by the way they point their cameras. Influencing millions and millions of people watching these sports events. It’s time the media start acknowledging and owning their role. Start changing the angle of their broadcasts. There’s so much beauty and strength in these incredible performances. Let’s focus on that!”
“Ultimately our goal is to make people think about how female athletes – and women in general – are judged by appearances rather than performances. We want to show the world that focusing on women’s bodies, rather than their abilities, is a form of sexism that needs to be challenged,” added Wunderman Thompson Singapore CCO Marco Versolato. “The ‘Change The Angle’ campaign website offers six simple guidelines to effect change in how female athletes are portrayed – and we hope that everyone who’s keen to see change will spread the word.”
Zozi Tunzi, Miss Universe 2019, added: “This is a bold and powerful move for a beauty brand like LUX to take, and it makes me even prouder to be a part of the LUX family. I am hoping to see the change that we need in the sports fraternity so that women athletes are celebrated for the amazing talent that they have rather than being objectified in a sexual manner. I encourage everyone to do what they can to participate and push media in South Africa and across the world to #Change the Angle.”
Comment
The rapidly growing global popularity of professional and amateur female sports is something to celebrate, but there remain major problems to overcome.
This is a bold initiative which hacked a live sports tournament to highlight sexism and one that also acknowledges that the issue, of course, is not just confined to the sports space. The objectification of women is a global issue and studies repeatedly show that the vast majority of women globally have been subject to it at some point in their everyday lives.
We’ve seen other brands use similar area of body real estate to promote their campaigns and messaging with various objectives: ranging from swimwear brand Budgie Smuggler’s ‘AU Brexit’ campaign to Betfair’s 2011 bumvertising initiative with Team GB beach volleyball stars Zara Dampney and Shauna Mullin for a London 2012 test event at Horse Guards Parade.
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