Manhattan Storage Companies Takes Out Billboard Ads To Lobby For Choice and Against Palin
By Nicole Belle Thursday Oct 23, 2008 12:20pm
(h/t Debra C for first picture)
WCBS-TV:
They're ads you may have seen around New York City. They're supposed to be promoting storage, but they have a political and comical edge to them.
But their latest ad doesn't have too many people laughing.
Its billboards have always been edgy, but has Manhattan Mini Storage gone over the edge?
The ad causing controversy depicts a coat hanger and takes a stance on abortion, along with the slogan: "Your closet space is shrinking as fast as her right to choose."
Needless to say, it didn't take long for the backlash to come.
"These billboards, we think they're absolutely disgusting," said Kiera McCaffrey of the Catholic League. [..]
Manhattan Mini Storage often uses liberal messages in its billboards, reflecting the politics of a city in which three-quarters of voters picked John Kerry over George Bush in 2004.
Their latest ad, as shown in a NYC subway station shows a woman's body, wearing a Palin-esque suit with a button that says "Choice" with a circle and a line through the word, with the ad line, "What's more limited, your closet space or her experience?"
Personally, I like the coathanger ad. I think that image is a stark reminder of the dangers of letting the government take choices away from women. Abortions will not decline if they repeal Roe v. Wade, they'll just become more dangerous.
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That's is quite an ad.
The coat hanger may be a bit strong for some.
The suggestion with the coat hanger is harsh, but I do thoroughly get the point.
The coat hanger is perfect. How else did you think women had abortions before Roe v Wade? If I wanted strong, I'd have a picture of a woman bleeding to death after trying to do an abortion by herself.
Yes, the coat hanger is perfect, and the real horror would be going back to it. Here's the company's webpage: http://www.manhattanministorage.com/
I just sent an e-mail to their marketing, marketing@edprop.com, commenting on the ad. Perhaps some of you will want to do likewise, to counteract some of their hate mail.
No kidding. I used to see an anti-abortion ad on a bus every day that showed what appeared to be the foot of an aborted fetus held between the thumb and fore finger of an adult hand. I can't remember the text but the foot was fully formed with all it's toes and looked to be about 1/2 inch long. The hanger is very mild by comparison.
She gasped at first, then raised her eyebrow and said, "Well, it's historically accurate. Maybe people need to be reminded".
Not only historically accurate, it is your FUTURE if you let the right wing crazies get into power.
I find them no more offensive than the "I have a heartbeat at three weeks!" adverts. It's about time Progressives got up in the grills of these self-righteous choiceophobes.
I've never understood how the 'small government' crowd can explain allowing the government to intrude within a woman's body.
What I tell the anti-choicers I speak to is, the Republicans had sole control of Congress for six years, if they were going to actually restrict a woman's right to choose, they would have done it. Obviously, therefore, they're simply stringing the anti-choice crowd along for their votes.
If we refuse sex ed. and choice this is exactly where what women will be forced to do. Let the message hit home. As a former Catholic they should just mind their own business and do what they want with their own bodies and not everyone else's.
Gee, I suppose that the fact that women had to shove a coat hanger up their crotches, swivel it around, half the time winding up bleeding to death when abortions were illegal isn't disgusting?
I remember those days! What is disgusting is that these fucking people want to make women go back to that.
It should be stronger. This is real. This was real. This is what will be real again should they decide to overturn Roe v. Wade.
In the 50's and 60's .. every week or two another heartbreaking news story of a young woman, sometimes in her teens, who bled to death from a botched abortion attempt.
The coathanger is a vivid reminder, lest we forget.
Better to face the bloody consequences in our imagination than in real life.
Support a woman's right to choose.
Good for them! I wish I lived in NY so I could patronize their business. Their ads are reminders of the reality that women will face if Roe v Wade is overturned. Abortions will not stop. Wealthy women will find a way to get a safe abortion. Women of lesser means will be butchered.
is another woman's Truth. When I was a young lad(a long.long.time ago),Husler magazine did a photo piece basically saying 'you think this mag is 'obscene'? Here's obscene-and showed pictures from Viet Nam of dead bodies with faces blown off,etc.It upset many people,but left a lasting impression on Me.
and that's one of the most obscene things about the Republican/religious/neo-con compassionate conservatives. They get their panties all in a wad worrying about a blastocyst, but think nothing of sending young men and women off to war, let alone thinking about the innocent men, women and children who will be murdered (who really knows how many that is in Iraq??)!
Nor do they consider the pain of being born as an unwanted child. How much worse is it for a sentient, conscious being to suffer years of neglect, punishment, starvation, etc. than for an embryo or fetus to be aborted??
I think these ads are very well done and reflect the reality of
the lives of many women who have no say about their own lives, even thier own bodies.
The topic is harsh. If they didn't upset anyone, they wouldn't be worth anything.
I salute the company for making a commitment and not trying to equivocate.
Okay, I'll admit I'm not crazy about the coat hanger ad, but I hope MMS doesn't cave and pull them. I may not like them, but that's my problem, not theirs.
The funny thing is, I've seen the other ad (the "choice" button) every day for weeks on the subway, but I never made the Palin connection until about a week ago.
to expose the hypocrisy of those Republican men, who routinely vilify homosexuals and deny them rights while privately engaging in said lifestyle.
/obvious
"Who really cares what Hollywood thinks? All these hacks come out there. Hollywood is controlled by secular Jews who hate Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. It's not a secret, okay? And I'm not afraid to say it. ... Hollywood likes anal sex. They like to see the public square without nativity scenes. I like families. I like children. They like abortions. I believe in traditional values and restraint. They believe in libertinism. We have nothing in common." [William Donohue, Catholic League President, on MSNBC, Scarborough Country, 12/8/04]
If certain people don't like the ads, then maybe they should try minding their own business and there wouldn't be a need for such ads.
"These billboards, we think they're absolutely disgusting," said Kiera McCaffrey of the Catholic League. [..]
The Catholic League is such a disingenuous bunch of hypocrites. I'm a reformed Catholic (current Agnostic), and 15 years of attempted brainwashing give me the right to say that. They have no problem passing around pictures of aborted fetuses to forward their agenda. Believe it or not, if you go to a Catholic school, aborted fetus pictures are even part of the curriculum, under the auspices of "Religion" class. In case you're wondering, we only studied one religion.
that "posession was 9 tenths of the law." If a lady doesn't 'posess' her own body, who does? (I know the fundies say her husband but I disagree there too.)
After the fall of communism, abortions didn't end in Eastern Europe once the catholic cult became dominant in their politics. Abortions continued, but solely as a tourist attraction: the poor had unwanted pregnancies, and the wealthy went on holiday to have an abortion.
The same thing will no doubt happen in the US if McCainchurian and Flailin' were to "win" via black box voting. Only the wealthy who can afford to travel to Canada or elsewhere will have access to safe medical care.
As for the political content, if the ads were pro-Palin or even anti-Obama, I doubt the reichwing would be doing much bitching and the Obama camp wouldn't be whining.
with genitalia and attendant systems is very weird.
They are terrified that people put their courting tackle in the "wrong" places and insist that a two thousand yearrs dead holy man will object unless the pegs go in the holes...unless one is a Republican pol living insecurely in a closet.
Sorry I gotta speak in such a juvenile way - but the Republicans have an unhealthy fixation on monitoring other peoples' genitalia on behalf of their pervert god - which is a "he."
Yes, the Republicans believe that the infinite Source of the Universe has a pee-pee, and it's reaaal important...
for shite sake...sheesh...grumble
They depict the cold hard truth. If you remove the ability for a women to get an abortion in a medical setting, they often resort to back alley alternatives that often involve... a metal coathanger.
So once again the Right is feigning outrage when confronted with the truth of their policies. I hope ministorage doesn't back down and remove the add. The truth is a good disinfectant...
Palin Touts Her Own Experience as a ‘Closet Organizer’
http://satiricalpolitical.com/?p=2969
As a rape survivor(age 12) I would like to say if Palin gets anywhere near the White House, I'm leaving this country.
Thank my lucky stars I was too young to get pregnant, but it sure fucked up my life for awhile.
This woman is despicable. There are no words to describe my hatred and fear of all she stands for.
It was horrible about what happened to you. However, you are mistakened if you believe that you were too young to get pregnant.
Your body may have been too young to bare a child, but your reproductive cyle would not have cared. You could have become pregnant.
Young girls in other parts of the world often do become pregnant as young as 11 or 12. And they may a horrible price.
Check out the to the fistula foundation to see what does happen every day.
http://www.fistulafoundation.org/aboutfistula/
It seems as if you rebuilt the rest of your life and are living well. I salute you.
I'm in Florida and I just voted. We waited in line only 15 minutes. Our voting place was so well organized it was amazing. Lots of young people waiting to vote too. That's such a good sign!
So when you hear that it's hell to vote in Florida, it's not like that everywhere.
That is wonderful to hear!
I'm very jealous that you got to vote. No early voting here but the polls open up at 6 am Election day!
Oh yeah, I can't wait to vote.
There's an angry old poll worker in my voting place. Every time I've voted there, he's made some kind of muttering, under-his-breath comment about "libruls." He really should not be there in that capacity, but he's old and I suppose it makes him feel more merkun.
I can't wait to proclaim my Democratic affiliation to this guy on voting day. Because he'll ask and then make a little face when I say "I'm a Democrat."
I just voted in Canada. If there was a guy there, old or not, muttering to people to vote for one party over another he would be removed and not welcomed back.
Should I have complained then the boss of that man would also be fired and that would be that.
Responsibility comes with the Authority, and if you have one I will getcha on the other.
Having lived through the days of back street illegal abortions as an ED nurse taking care of women, mostly married and with children as they died from a coat hanger abortion or knitting needles, I love the ads. They are not graffic enough. Women died; women became sterile; women got horrific infections. We must have control over our bodies to be truly equal citizens. If you don't believe in abortions don't have one, but leave the rest of us alone to make our own choices.
I used to be an ICU nurse in the inner city in the late seventies.
I remember a girl of about twelve or thirteen who transferred in from emergency surgery following an attempted abortion using a caustic fluid.
She was in horrible pain, but she survived.
I remember the docs saying that she could never bear children.
This, thanks to religious morons and their never ending quest to make other people "moral."
I have zero problems with these ads, but just imagine the uproar if they were anti-Obama.
How could pro-choice ads be anti-Obama?
You know what I mean.
this smacks of military complex making
sure that if/when the iraq/afganistan war(s)
are ended, they will have that next multi-billion
dollar contract in their pocket.
fuck the reichwingneocons and military complex.
wake up America, military corps want
ALL your money and your future.
oops, this was meant for the 33 minute comments
Whoah!! This guy usually knows what he's talking about - what'd I miss?
I love seeing the how creative the ads can be, but the storage ads always stand out among them because they do have a political undertones.
These particular ones are appropriate (both the Sarah Palin look-alike and the hanger)!! There have been too many anti-choice ads lately and they were starting to make me paranoid that some fundamentalists pseudo-Christians were trying to take up all the ad space.
... who gives a flying f*ck what Kiera McCaffrey of the Catholic League thinks? Do we know anything about her? Is there a reason to respect either her, or her opinion?
Time to stop giving religious extremists any credibility in the public arena. Let them go back to their churches and their flocks.
I thought that billboard with the clothes hanger on it was for a reissue of Mommy Dearest.
So they are pro-choice. What's shocking about that? Coathangers are historically accurate (as someone mentioned above.) There is no hate, ranting or smearing, just a timely reminder.
Heh, there was one a few months ago that was something like "your closet is as narrow as Cheney's mind" -- not quite that, but it was a clear dig. I meant to take a photo but never got around to it.
While I find it pretty clever, I'm essentially the choir. **shrug**
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