# Apple and Adobe Slammed for ‘Sexist’ Photoshop Fix Demo That Made a Woman Smile



## rexbobcat (Sep 11, 2015)

Apple and Adobe Slammed for 'Sexist' Photoshop Fix Demo That Made a Woman Smile


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## JacaRanda (Sep 11, 2015)




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## Designer (Sep 11, 2015)

I don't get it.  Why is there some kind of uproar over this?  Who are these people who are complaining?  They're selling software, folks!  Either you find it useful or you don't, but sexist? I don't understand.


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## rexbobcat (Sep 11, 2015)

They think it reinforces the Western patriarchal power structure in which men feel entitled to women.

IE: Men harassing women on the street by catcalling and telling them to smile


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## Ysarex (Sep 11, 2015)

Really should have used a photo of Saint Steve.

Joe


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## Designer (Sep 11, 2015)

rexbobcat said:


> They think it reinforces the Western patriarchal power structure in which men feel entitled to women.
> 
> IE: Men harassing women on the street by catcalling and telling them to smile


A stretch at most.  

Thanks for the interpretation.


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## Tuonenlapsi (Sep 12, 2015)

Ysarex said:


> Really should have used a photo of Saint Steve.
> 
> Joe
> 
> View attachment 107949


This is so offensive! YOU ARE OFFENDING THE MEMORY OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR STEVE JOBS!


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## limr (Sep 12, 2015)

Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled? If so, how many times has it happened? Once? Twice? 1,258?

And I'm not saying that they did anything horribly wrong, but it IS annoying that so much of this technology is being driven by the "need" to make women's faces prettier. As for the more overtly sexist part, the software is a "fix" and using this demo suggests that a woman not smiling needs to be "fixed." There was nothing wrong with the original photo, but apparently the model needed to be "fixed" into someone who was less threatening and more sexually inviting.

They really could have come up with a better demo, a true "fix." How about half-closed eyes, for example? Someone caught saying the "ch" instead of the "eeeese"? I mean, it's an app for selfies and cell phone snaps, after all.


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## BananaRepublic (Sep 12, 2015)

I thought Steve Jobbs refused to allow adobe to be associated with Apple products because they were incompetent but I suppose Jobbs is a corpse and cash is king. Here is something else interesting Apple owes Ireland 19 billion dollars.


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## Designer (Sep 12, 2015)

limr said:


> Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled?


Not in so many words, but if someone manipulated my photo and did it artfully, I would have no objection.


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## The_Traveler (Sep 12, 2015)

limr said:


> Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled? If so, how many times has it happened? Once? Twice? 1,258?



*Just a few times but when I did smile, she smiled back and I really felt so pretty it made my day.*
_________________________________________________________________
The genders are unequal in many ways - and interest in the physical attractiveness of whatever one sees as the object of their desire is one of them. 
This may be an appropriate issue and Adobe should respond.
But it really seems a meta-response to an issue that is otherwise unmanageable.

The real problem is, in this world as we have it, women make incredible efforts to 'look good', to be 'pretty'.  They expend enormous amounts of effort - and money - on that and inevitably men respond to the final result.  And because women do these things, men accept that as the way we should see them.

The inevitable response I expect here is that women do it because they are forced to by the male hegemony. Guess what.  
Much to my surprise, I get no memos from hegemony-central asking for my approval about women's makeup, clothing, shoes, magazines etc. so that industry and fashion can proceed.
As a individual male, seems to be not my responsibility or problem.


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## medic2230 (Sep 12, 2015)

limr said:


> Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled? If so, how many times has it happened? Once? Twice? 1,258?
> 
> And I'm not saying that they did anything horribly wrong, but it IS annoying that so much of this technology is being driven by the "need" to make women's faces prettier. As for the more overtly sexist part, the software is a "fix" and using this demo suggests that a woman not smiling needs to be "fixed." There was nothing wrong with the original photo, but apparently the model needed to be "fixed" into someone who was less threatening and more sexually inviting.
> 
> They really could have come up with a better demo, a true "fix." How about half-closed eyes, for example? Someone caught saying the "ch" instead of the "eeeese"? I mean, it's an app for selfies and cell phone snaps, after all.



Well, it probably doesn't fix the half-closed eyes so they had to make it look like it did something awesome to sell it.


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## Overread (Sep 12, 2015)

limr said:


> Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled? If so, how many times has it happened? Once? Twice? 1,258?



I just get called Jesus sometimes



It does seem that this is an example where the individual event is pretty minor; but that its representative of a culmination of little ones that amount to a general direction. However the issue is muddied because whilst you can argue that a lot of technology is driven by sexist desires to "improve" women; many women similarly want to have these technologies developed. 

So its a vicious cycle; although at present it does seem to favour the female gender over the male. IT might just be a phase in overall product marketing mantra - ergo put a woman on it and it will sell (rather like in fantasy if you put a dragon on the front cover its said to boost your sales potential). Sometimes its mantra/theory because there is little to counter and once its working it reinforces itself; which makes it very hard to change because there is a lot of evidence to prove that it does "work".


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## wyogirl (Sep 12, 2015)

I get accused of Resting Bi**h Face all the time... I'm ok with it.


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## jake337 (Sep 12, 2015)

I'm just trying to figure out why apple was even advertising it like it's something new. 

An editing app on my phone called Cymera could do that years ago.


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## unpopular (Sep 12, 2015)

Designer said:


> I don't get it.  Why is there some kind of uproar over this?  Who are these people who are complaining?  They're selling software, folks!  Either you find it useful or you don't, but sexist? I don't understand.



There are reports of women being harassed by oogling men by demanding them to "smile" all the time. Some women claim it happens regularly enough to be bothersome. This is sexist because these women feel pressured to always have a sunny disposition.

I think this is something that is culturally bound to urban United States, and is a more recent trend.


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## vintagesnaps (Sep 12, 2015)

In the demo he does at least refer to the 'model' and it looks like an ad. So that might be a legit reason for this, but still... don't know what they were thinking. I mean, even on here guys often post critique to a photo of a female model in a swimsuit and critique her, not the photo.


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## Designer (Sep 12, 2015)

vintagesnaps said:


> .. and critique her, not the photo.


I've seen that many times, but the OP was a link to an ad for software, not critiquing the model.

For all we know it could have been a negative on the part of the photographer.


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## Tuonenlapsi (Sep 13, 2015)

limr said:


> Okay, here's a question for you guys: How many of you have been approached by a random stranger and told that you would look so much nicer if you just smiled? If so, how many times has it happened? Once? Twice? 1,258?


Not by a random stranger very much but I do get a lot of "don't look so grim" and "you smile so rarely" as if I am obligated to be constantly happy around people. I live in a country where people make very little contact to strangers, and if there is someone saying things like you said, it's going to be an intoxicated old man or an equally shitfaced woman. I just don't understand what's up with you americans


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## unpopular (Sep 13, 2015)

BananaRepublic said:


> I thought Steve Jobbs refused to allow adobe to be associated with Apple products because they were incompetent but I suppose Jobbs is a corpse and cash is king. Here is something else interesting Apple owes Ireland 19 billion dollars.



First of all, Apple and Adobe have always had a good relationship, except in one area: Flash - a technology which Adobe is even phasing out because, well, it sucks - and any competent web designer after 1998 knows why - it's resource heavy, proprietary, insecure and annoying to work with. Literally though, Flash is the only product which Apple has had a problem with Adobe, and if Flash were Adobe's only product, then yes, I'd agree - they'd be incompetent. However, the facts are that Apple has embraced all other Adobe technologies, such as Postscript and PDF. 

Not sure why Windows fanboys feel the need to warp this issue into something it isn't. Apple has decided not to invest in a dying technology on iOS. That's all.

By the way, Apple owes $8B in back taxes. not $19B. Being that I'm not Irish, I don't particularly care.


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## BananaRepublic (Sep 13, 2015)

unpopular said:


> BananaRepublic said:
> 
> 
> > I thought Steve Jobbs refused to allow adobe to be associated with Apple products because they were incompetent but I suppose Jobbs is a corpse and cash is king. Here is something else interesting Apple owes Ireland 19 billion dollars.
> ...



The Figure of 19 has been thrown around here but Apple are said to have accounted for this in there books any way and which ever figure is correct Apple could pull that kind of money from down the back of the sofa. The whole thing is being hushed up by the state over here to the extent that the Government is fighting against the EU in court over the matter. Irelands official position is that Apple don't owe us any money.


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