When Language Outlives Intent: Lessons from Dettol

24 July 2026

Amandeep Sandhu:

Why communicators must understand the cultural memory embedded in language

When a brand apologises twice for essentially the same cultural blind spot, the problem is no longer the campaign. It is the communication process behind it.

Dettol recently found itself in a soup after releasing a five-minute micro-drama in China centred around a man searching for a partner who is “clean” and “untainted by other men.” Offended by what she hears, the woman ends the relationship. The campaign attempts to expose toxic masculinity by drawing a parallel between harmful bacteria and “toxic men”, presenting Dettol as the solution. The anthropomorphising device was intended to challenge prejudice. Instead, it reproduced it. Reckitt apologised, explaining that the campaign had failed to communicate its intended message.

The backlash was hardly surprising. Only last year, Dettol faced criticism in China over another advertisement carrying the line: “The woman was returned just before her wedding; it must be because she was not clean.”

A single word upended the campaign.

Returned.

Something is returned because it no longer meets expectations.

Words like returned, clean, pure, fresh and tainted are never just adjectives. They arrive carrying histories that extend far beyond the dictionary. The advert in question follows a similar pattern. The man is evaluated for his behaviour. He is toxic, insecure and controlling. The woman is evaluated through a vocabulary of condition: clean, untouched, tainted.

The advertisement did not invent that asymmetry. It borrowed it. That is the communication challenge.

Communication Never Begins on a Blank Page

Communication does not begin when a campaign is released. It begins in the audience’s mind, already populated by stories, metaphors, prejudices, rituals and memories accumulated over generations.

This explains why certain advertisements provoke such visceral reactions. The audience is rarely responding to the campaign alone. More often, it becomes the trigger that releases long-held memories beneath the surface. A snide remark, an uncomfortable encounter, a humiliating question or an old stereotype suddenly finds expression. The campaign becomes the catalyst. The emotional response belongs to a much older story.

The media is often described as a mirror of society. I have never been entirely convinced by that metaphor. A mirror reflects what already exists.

Communication decides which stories continue to circulate, which metaphors endure and which assumptions are carried into the next generation. Every campaign is, in that sense, an act of cultural transmission.

What We Choose to Transmit

One of the enduring declarations in the Analects is Confucius’s assertion: “I transmit, I do not invent.”

Chinese philosopher Confucius lived during one of the most turbulent periods in Chinese history. The authority of the Zhou dynasty had weakened, kingdoms were at war, and the moral order had begun to unravel. His mission was to preserve and transmit the wisdom of the ancient sages because he believed transmission itself was an act of responsibility.

Modern advertising presents an intriguing inversion of that philosophy.

Advertising celebrates originality. Every campaign promises disruption and fresh thinking. Yet when it comes to portraying gender, race, age or class, it often reaches for stereotypes. The visual language changes, the cultural assumptions remain remarkably familiar.

Where Confucius sought to preserve wisdom, communication today sometimes ends up preserving prejudice. Not deliberately, but because inherited stereotypes are efficient and instantly recognisable. They become creative shortcuts.

When Language Enters Institutions

A recent custody dispute in Pune drew public attention for an observation made by the court while deciding the child’s custody. It noted that the mother had failed in her duties towards her husband. I have no intention of debating the legal merits of the order. My interest lies in the language.

Judicial observations carry institutional authority. Whether intended or not, the wording appeared to link a woman’s role as a wife to her role as a mother. Language has an extraordinary ability to normalise relationships between ideas without ever stating them explicitly.

Narratives travel through ordinary expressions that gradually cease to sound extraordinary.

The Cost of Creative Shortcuts

Dettol is not an isolated case.

French carmaker Renault once launched a campaign for the Twingo featuring a nail polish that doubled as touch-up paint for the vehicle. Intended for young professional women, the advertisement was widely interpreted as reinforcing another familiar stereotype: women drivers are expected to scrape and scratch their cars.

The intent may have been playful. The interpretation was cultural.

Communicators often defend campaigns by pointing to intent. Audiences respond to meaning. The two are rarely the same.

A stereotype works because it is instantly recognisable. That efficiency is precisely what makes it dangerous. Every time communication borrows an old stereotype to create instant relatability, it extends the life of the very narrative it may have hoped to transcend.

This raises an uncomfortable question: Why reach for stereotypes at all?

The Editorial Responsibility

Culture is layered, lived and constantly evolving. It is impossible to grasp every nuance. Communication is never just about choosing the right words. It is about recognising the stories those words have already lived.

But somewhere in the pursuit of a punchier headline, a disruptive campaign or an award-winning idea, context often becomes the first casualty.

This brings me to the fundamentals: If context determines how language will be received, shouldn’t brands invest as much in understanding the cultural memory embedded in language as they do in understanding consumer behaviour?

Perhaps every campaign is, in the end, an editorial decision. Not simply about what to say. But about which stories deserve another telling.

The Dettol campaign discovered that intent has a remarkably short life.

Language does not.

+++

Amandeep Sandhu is a strategic communications consultant with over two decades of experience spanning journalism, corporate communications and editorial strategy. She works with organisations to shape narratives, simplify complex ideas and develop communication grounded in clarity, context and cultural insight.