AXE products seem to have become a staple amongst young men. Their crude, hyper-masculine advertisements continue to appeal to consumers. However, ads like the one pictured above communicate some pretty disturbing messages. It tries to sell "the AXE effect": an abrupt and uninhibited attraction that girls feel when catching a whiff of one of their products. In doing so, they use a situation portraying a sexualized female therapist using a doll to discuss an incident of sexual assault involving sorority girls and AXE's target consumer -- a young man. The ad parodies a method used by psychologists in child rape cases.

The message this ad is sending is that for a man, any sex is good. Any form of intercourse -- rape or not -- will help to raise your status as a "Real Man." This ad rewards male rape with a high-five; this is what you want, because it's sex, right? With AXE, you're guaranteed sex, however consensual. They were hot sorority girls; of course it's what you wanted. Even when it wasn't. These implications are what cause men to avoid reporting rape perpetrated by females for fear of being ridiculed. These standards leave no room for vulnerability or a lack of control in a sexual situation. 

But these harmful expectations affect both men and women. When you convince boys that they're nothing more than sexual predators, they start to treat women like prey. This mentality is a huge contributor to the shocking number of sexual assaults in America. It causes them to feel it necessary to assert their dominance, both physically and emotionally, in order to be considered the ideal "manly man."    

By signing this petition, you agree that AXE and other media outlets should not be endorsing a standard of masculinity that encourages men to supress emotion, vulnerability, and self-awareness, nor should it measure masculinity by quantity of sex. It's time to reassess what we as a society view as standards for the ideal man, and when an influential company such as AXE changes their ads, others will follow suit.