Gender constructions in Clarks shoes for kids adverts

An interesting piece of everyday sexism reported by The Daily Mail. Even more interesting was the whole page of comments I read with everyone agreeing that it was ridiculous to complain about something that was blatantly a wise marketing decision that reflected what boys and girls were actually like. I was shocked. Boys and girls are taught to be like that - adverts purport to reflect us but they shape us subconsciously, building the consumer (you will remember that phrase from Fairclough). I would have thought modern marketing companies would know better than to be so blatant about it. But then again the news story wasn't big enough for me to find any Guardian articles about it, so maybe not many people made an issue of it...



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2661975/Parents-attack-sexist-Clarks-shoe-ads-Posters-use-blue-tree-climbing-boys-pink-girls-love-comfort-style.html

Look at the lexical choices in the adverts. And in the comments. Why do you thnk gendered products and gendered marketing are done?