The Cure for Your Fugly Armpits
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This '60s-era ad for vaginal deodorant tells women that their real problem isn't underarm stench—it's "worry-making" odors in the "most girl part" of their bodies.
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The reason you're single is because of those noxious fumes from down below, this Lysol ad implies.
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Too bad that Lysol was ineffective, not to mention dangerous, when used for its implied purpose as a contraceptive. Used too often or improperly diluted, it burned and blistered the vagina, and in some cases even caused death.
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The phrase "often a bridesmaid but never a bride" was made famous by Listerine ads. In one 1925 image, a woman reads another woman's wedding announcement with a troubled expression on her face. "Her case was really a pathetic one," the copy intones, describing the woman as nowhere near marriage "as her birthdays crept gradually toward that tragic thirty mark." The culprit? Halitosis, of course.
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Like every woman, Edna's primary ambition was to marry! Too bad that stinky breath is holding her back.
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Really hammering home that "often a bridesmaid" junk …
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"Many a woman who says, 'No, I am never annoyed at perspiration,' does not know the facts—does not realize how much sweeter and daintier she would be if she were entirely free from it." The facts!
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"Be confident of your daintiness," exhorted a 1960 ad for Massengill Powder, offering a " 'clean' refreshing fragrance [that] makes you confident you will not offend."
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Like Lysol douche, products such as FDS, Massengill Powder, and Bidette Mist at once aroused anxiety about women's vaginas and offered solutions to the problem.