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We often sit around the Chicagoist office wondering how “Viagra Triangle” could get any more ridiculous and trashy -- with men throwing around money and women with implants and botox taking it all in -- it's just like the fairy tales of our youth. Lucky for us, our question was recently answered when, lo and behold, in swept attorney Corri Fetman and her billboard advertisement proclaiming, “Life's Short. Get a Divorce.” The ad sits atop the parking garage behind Gibson’s and features the headless torso of a man with 12-pack abs and a woman with very large breasts in a black lacy bra, a thong and thigh-high stockings. It reeks of class like a dumpster full of seafood scraps sitting in 100-degree heat for a week.
And now, all hell is breaking loose. Comments are pouring in from numerous realms of the divorce world; other attorneys and counselors who say the ad is “grotesque,” “undignified,” “offensive,” and that it “trivializes divorce.”
Fetman claims that she is trying to put a different spin on law advertisements, to spice them up a bit. She hopes the billboard will speak to those who are already thinking of ending their marriage, “if you're already going to leave your spouse, the ad will appeal to you. If you do want to leave, you don't have to feel bad about it. Be honest with yourself and with your spouse."
While we agree with Fetman – a billboard isn’t going to make a person get divorced (hopefully) – it does make light of a decision that shouldn’t be made lightly. If someone wants to get out of a marriage, they certainly need to be honest with themselves and their spouse, there’s no argument there, but the images on the board suggest less honesty and more, “Life's Short. Leave Your Spouse for a Hot Chick in Black Lingerie or Dude With Big, Rippling Muscles.” Not the most positive perspective on the issue, but a seemingly perfect fit for its strategic placement.
Image via Cinderella's Pumpkin.
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It reeks of class like a dumpster full of seafood scraps sitting in 100-degree heat for a week.
Quite possibly the best sentence I have ever read on this site.
I don't really see the problem. Divorce hasn't been taboo for 30 years - I think we can start making light-hearted jokes about it.
PR Coup d'Etat!
Get divorced. Then see how lighthearted you feel...
Get divorced. Then see how lighthearted you feel...
AMEN!
Let me get this straight: child abuse, poverty, sub-standard schools, people being gunned down daily in our streets... those are the things that seem “grotesque," “undignified,” and “offensive” to me. Yet this BILLBOARD is what people choose to get all offended about? Unbelievable.
I don't know about you, chiflyguy, but I find it easy to be offended about many things all at the same time. Just because today it's a billboard, doesn't mean that tomorrow they aren't outraged over child abuse. Lesser things than all of the worrisome things you mentioned are just as worthy of criticism and emotional reaction.
leave it to the heterosexuals to destroy both the sanctity of marriage and divorce!
I don't see what the big deal is. Another "controversy" brought on by people who insist on saving us all from ourselves. Some people do, in fact, leave a spouse for a "newer model" - this is not dishonesty, it is reality. But the point I want to make is more about people who keep giving this silly billboard more attention than it merits.
If you're the type of person who would get a divorce solely because a billboard suggests it, we can all assume that you shouldn't have been married in the first place.
Likewise, if you're the type who is easily-and-deeply offended by this billboard, realize how much more attention you're giving it by complaining (or even by posting it to a blog like Chicagoist). Consider the consequences of your reactions: The ad was put in that particular spot to get talked about, so the more it's talked about, the more the ad is likely to be considered a success. By showing how much this ad is talked about, you may be sending more clients to Fetman's doorstep... as if you're begging for the chance to be offended again.
Pylbug - Of course, the firm wanted publicity, but if I had to for a million dollars name the law firm, I couldn't. Their ploy failed with me and probably a lot of others. But perhaps they'll get asked onto talk shows and achieve their ultimate aim of getting famous and getting more clients. Whatever. The ad made a joke of something that isn't at all funny, but it didn't offend me nearly as much as the billboard for a talk radio stations that boasts "Liberals Hate It." I wanted to tag that sucker every time I saw it.
You seem to get offended rather easily, Ferdy. I mean, a billboard seriously drove you to thoughts of criminal activity? Someone needs to buy you a beer.
Yes, some shit lack class, but that doesn't mean I am offended by it. Learn the difference.
By the way, I'm divorced, and I've been around some pretty ugly divorces, and I'm pretty lighthearted about the whole thing, so yet another theory of offense bites the dust.
Well, goody for you, Vise. I guess I'm never supposed to have a reaction that might create, oh my, thoughts of illegality. Get over yourself, Vise. You don't know everything. Stop trying to school me on the right way to think and behave.
Make you a deal, Ferdy: I will get over myself if you stop being so offended at things that really should have no power to offend. Then perhaps we will both be more acceptable members of online society.
And believe me, I am not trying to "school"* you, dude or dudette. I am just pointing out that even for people who are supposed to be offended, offense didn't come. Quite the contrary. After all, you set the challenge: "Get divorced. Then see how lighthearted you feel."
Well, my heart lost about 100 pounds after my divorce, and I'm still feeling great, and I can laugh at the classless billboard and know it lacks class but somehow not get offended. Too bad you cannot. Thus, the suggestion of beer. Shall I buy? Perhaps we can talk about lawyers and alimony and dividing up furniture and such. (I know people who stutter who don't mind stuttering jokes, by the way, and people with cancer who can laugh at their hair loss. Shocking, I know, but this is how it is when you live in a world where you don't get offended all the time.)
*Thanks for using the aging term "school" as a verb. It takes me back to my days among the pipsqueaks, when I tried to school them on the difference between right and wrong. It also reminds me of those early '90s gangbanger flicks for some reason, though I am not certain the term "school" was ever used in those movies.
Even for people who are supposed to be offended, offense didn't come.
Change that to "I wasn't offended, even though I am divorced." You do not speak for all divorced people.
My divorce was a horrifyingly painful experience, and a joker I know saw fit to "congratulate" me. Thanks for validating how great it is to be a failure. Well, I got over that, but most people do not feel happy about the end of a marriage, even if it is for the best. Whether the ad offends all of them, I can't say. I'm not all bent out of shape about it, but the world would have been a better place if that sign hadn't been in it.
The online world forces people who participate in it to respond to what the writer writes. If I totally agree with something or read something informational, then there's no reason to say, "Hey, I'm not offended by this." I'm not offended by a lot of things. I speak up about things that call for discussion and various points of view. If that makes me sound like I'm offended all the time, consider the nature of blogging and how limited it is in providing a well-rounded picture of a person.
the thing about it that seemed truly offensive to me was that if you looked at how the billboard was constructed, it didn't seem to be an existing, permanent or semi-permanent billboard. it seemed like it was just a large banner stretched over a backing large enough to support it, so in addition to the subject matter that people seem to be upset over, it seemed physically to be pretty shoddily put together. i think this actually was what natarus, et al were bothered by. and hey, if you're gonna put up a big ass ugly billboard right over a city street, you had better be paying for it, and plenty.
I am embarrassed to say that I formerly attended classes with Corri Fetman at DePaul. Although I had not thought of her in almost two decades, when I learned of the risque billboard my immediate reaction was "nothing changes." Fetman's persona at the law school was that of a spoiled "princess." Although she was a capable student, she probably spent as much if not more time preening and choosing her clothes and jewelry than she did studying her casebooks. She was like a forerunner of Paris Hilton. Apparently, she also learned legal ethics from watching episodes of "Ally McBeal."
Her gleeful remarks about her personal trainer were priceless. Isn't it laughable, that so many of the people who boast about their personal trainers and hours spent in the gym at the health club always look to have spent considerable sums on cosmetic surgery? Fetman looks as if she has undergone an extreme makeover of her own, but she is fooling no one. She comes across as a total narcissist.
I almost did not recognize her from the newspaper photographs. The individual photos on her legal web site look like something from an adult escort service. Bleached blonde and tanned, Fetman appears to have forgotten to button her blouse and she is sucking on her eyeglasses. Will the Attorney Registration & Disciplinary Committee take any action? Probably not.
Thankfully, in one of his last aldermanic actions, Burton Natarus had the billboard removed since Fetman failed to obtain a proper sign permit.
By the way, Fetman's own divorce proceeding, which did not involve children, took nearly four years to complete. Multiple attorneys filed appearances and motioned to withdraw from the case. I do not see how this promotes confidence in Fetman's maturity or stability. The activity for the divorce can be viewed at the Clerk of the Circuit Court's website.