Oh, you dare, Fast Company, you dare. That's why you're the out-of-the-box thinkpiece trend story content generator!
Most would-be parents prefer boys, not girls. Is part of the trouble, dare we say, a branding problem--one that advertising could solve?Unfortunately, the ad agencies you asked to cook up PSA-style campaigns to promote girl have all failed pretty embarrassingly. They're either targeted to exactly the young, hip forward-looking dads who are probably the absolute last demographic to need enlightenment [72 and Sunny]; or they actually demonize boys and/or ape the patriarchal power imbalances that empowered, educated, wanted girls are supposed to eliminate.
It seems to me that the real issue here--on earth, in human civilization--is not in sperm sorting clinics on the Upper East Side, but in developing countries where traditional-to-medieval views still hold sway.
It's stopping the millions of gender based abortions, infanticides, and abandonments across China and Southeast Asia. It's improving education and equality and security to girls and women everywhere.
And it seems like the way to do that is to emphasize the prosperity that a less girl-hostile society will bring. And dare I say, it's not all a branding problem. It's a policy problem, too. If old age care is the real concern, do what China's doing, and offer pensions for parents of girls. If dowries are the reason girl babies are being killed, then figure out how to change the dowry dynamic. Tax it. Outlaw it. Advertise against it. Why doesn't Fast Company ask some politicians and NGOs how to shift that needle instead?
The Case for Girls [fastcompany]
Ads To Rebrand Baby Girls [fastcompany]
... because that might mean they would have to place a few phone calls outside of Manhattan?