In one of our reading, Gill coined the "new sexism" to highlight how discrimination is practiced and portrayed through media. The Brite detergent ad is an example that reinforces the gender binary. The ad starts where the husband gets his shirt dirty at his workplace; the husband is shown as the breadwinner. He then encounters a "woman" who is taking the kids to the school-motherly duties. The wife tells the husband that "brite sae sab right kar dia" indicates that she washed his clothes. These actions reiterate women's gender roles, which are linked to nurturing and doing household chores expected from a good wife or mother. Perhaps, these can be described as "unspeakable inequalities"(Gill) that are largely unnoticed and unspoken about even by those most adversely affected by it. As in this case, even as a viewer initially, I didn't understand this in terms of sexism because the roles and responsibilities of both genders are deeply ingrained and continuously reinforced by media.
It is sad how the media reinforces these gender roles in different ways; for example, we often see women as "independent" beings earning for themselves, yet they need a man to assist them. We see women striving to work, but only after a divorce because financial independence never becomes a priority until something "bad" happens to them. We are constantly trying to show empowered women in our media, yet failing because, in the end, they all "need a man." Similar is this media piece that openly talks in words of gender.
link: https://youtu.be/XFYko7SysUk