(09/05/68)
NOW sponsored a boycott of all Colgate-Palmolive products to protest the company’s long-standing fragrant discrimination against female employees. In addition to the usual separate seniority lists, unequal pay rates, and exclusion from promotion to better jobs on the grounds of “state protective legislation,” the company has been laying off women with more than twenty years seniority to hire men with no seniority in their places. We demonstrated for five days in front of the company’s New York City headquarters on Park Avenue. Anselma Dell’Olio and Barbara Love of New York NOW led the action with picket signs that read “Down the Drain With Ajax,” “The White Knight Is A Dirty Old Man” and “Cold Power Versus Woman Power.” One of the days featured a “flush in,” where New York NOW members poured Colgate products into a real toilet.
Everyone is urged not to buy any Colgate products. Let’s not contribute to our own oppression.