Gillette Gone WOKE?

So what? The interwebs are full of articles and video-logs about world famous razor and blade manufacturer Gillette, after their latest ad-campaign; the manly brand seems to have gone full SJW on us, showing how bad men are behaving towards women.

_{source: YouTube}

Apart from showing "toxic masculinity" not being a really clever way to sell razor-blades to your core customers, who all have facial hair, I really don't have much to say about the ad. This is just one of many ways we are constantly reminded that there's no escaping politics, not even in our movies, not even when selling razor-blades. It's important to talk about Gillette, but the reason for that has nothing to do with SJW tactics or the eons old differences between the sexes.

The reason why Gillette is an interesting topic, is because it's one of the best examples of how capitalism fails us and the planet. Everybody knows the name Gillette, but how many know the name William Painter? Painter was the inventor of the crown cork, or at least he was the one who scored the patent. Look up "crown cork" and you find that the crown cork was the first highly successful disposable product.

Disposable product. Remember that. One of William Painter's employees at his highly succesful crown cork factory, was King C. Gillette. Gillette, not content with this lowly position and wanting to create a fortune of his own, one day had a conversation with the boss, who told him: "King, you are always thinking and inventing; why don't you try to create something like the 'Crown Cork?' Something that's thrown away after it is used. ... The customer keeps coming back for more. Each new customer becomes a permanent foundation of profit."

_{source: MBI Concepts Corporation}

There is no reason whatsoever to make caps for bottles that cannot be reused, other that the reason given by old man Painter. Now, or at least back in 2017, Crown Holdings was listed number 333 in the Fortune 500 with sales of 8.3 billion dollars. Gillette listened well and years later introduced us to his disposable razor-blades. Nowadays the razor and blades model is described as selling an item at a low price in order to sell complementary or consumable products later; Gillette sells you the handheld razor at low cost, and then makes a high margin of profit by selling the blades. Even Sony PlayStations and Microsoft Xbox's are sold at minimal profits in order to make a killing on the games, or as we move into the always online age, on the subscriptions.

Painter and Gillette have given us the most obvious and most instant forms of planned obsolescence imaginable, and show like no other why the singular pursuit of profits disregards common sense. Perpetual growth implies a perpetual quest in search of new ways to grow; Painter and Gillette show perfectly how this type of economic model has absolutely nothing to do with efficiency. And yet the term "economy" is often described as careful management of available resources. To be "economical" is perceived to be efficient, to not be wasteful; neither of these apply to the free market economy. That's what we should be talking about.

_{Gillette's 'We believe: the best men can be' razors commercial takes on toxic masculinity}

The best a man can get? You decide for yourself. The ad in itself is totally harmless; it's the discussion, the toxic discussion ABOUT the ad that distracts, that divides us, the common folk. Gillette won't sell one blade less, if anything this means a lot of free extra publicity for them, something they might even have gambled on in advance. Believe me, the real fight we're facing is NOT toxic masculinity vs. toxic femininity. It's against a failing economic ideology that promotes waste, inefficiency, selfishness and concentration of unchecked power. Bottles work just as well with a screw-cap and razor blades can be made to last multiple lifetimes with a diamond coating.

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