Bras 'n Stereotypes 'n Things

Bras n' Things naughty nurse lingerie January 5, 2005 -- Australian nurses have succeeded in ending advertising for a "naughty nurse" outfit sold by major retailer Bras 'n Things. However, the product remains for sale in the lingerie chain's 150+ stores in Australia and New Zealand, even though the Australian Nursing Federation (ANF) has reportedly called for a boycott of the stores unless the outfit is "dropped." The unsigned January 4 piece "Poster makes nurses ill" in the Herald Sun tells the basic story prior to the pulling of the ads, and gets the nurses' point across, though it also includes some condescending description of them. The Center salutes Australian nurses, especially the Australian Nursing Federation, for this campaign. We urge Bras 'n Things to retire the naughty nurse item.

The arch piece in the Herald Sun, which includes the photo we have here, accurately describes the outfit as "an all-white bustier and mini-skirt" with red piping and a Red Cross logo, and "just in case some people are on medication, and don't quite get it, there's even a cute little cap with 'Naughty Nurse' written across it." The piece notes that the woman modeling the outfit is carrying a "stockwhip, but what that's got to do with nursing is beyond us."

The story includes several strong quotes from Lisa Fitzpatrick, the "Victorian secretary" of the Australian Nurses Federation. Fitzpatrick rightly notes that the ad shows nurses as "sex objects, rather than highly educated, skilled professionals" and that nurses "including the 8% who are male" will find it offensive. She urges nurses, their patients and their families not to go near the retailer's stores in protest. The ANF's national president Jill Illife reportedly told the Sun that nurses would "boycott Bras 'n Things this month unless the outfit was dropped." (See Ms. Illife's letter to Bras 'n Things (doc).)

The piece gets the nurses' basic points across, and its lighthearted approach to the controversy doesn't exactly come as a shock. But we could probably live without its comments that "the modern day Florence Nightingales are banging their bedpans" about the ads, that Fitzpatrick "has got the squirts" (a term for projectile diarrhea) about it, and that the ANF national office is having "an attack of the vapours." Those statements tend to suggest that nurses protesting the ad are hysterical ninnies whose main work tool is the bedpan.

As the Center has explained in the past, linking such apparel so closely to the profession of nursing--to even the fantasy idea that working nurses are sexually available to patients and physicians--reinforces long-standing stereotypes. Those stereotypes continue to discourage practicing and potential nurses, foster sexual violence in the workplace, and contribute to a general atmosphere of disrespect, all of which works against the profession in the midst of a critical global shortage that threatens lives. Desexualizing the nursing image is an important part of building the strength the profession needs to meet the challenges of 21st Century health care.

See the Melbourne Herald Sun's article "Poster makes nurses ill," which was reprinted in The Queensland Courier-Mail.

Also see a follow-up article by the Herald Sun, quoting letters from a number of men who present less than compelling reasons why nurses should stop protesting the naughty nurse lingerie. See "Naughty and Nice Nurse," in the January 5, 2005 issue of the Herald Sun.

Click here to join the boycott and send a letter to Bras n' Things to ask them to stop selling their "naughty nurse" lingerie item.