An ad depicting the very real struggles that mothers face in the days after giving birth was rejected for being ‘too graphic’

We all (should) know that pregnancy involves blood, pain and waking up to a body that’s a little different from the one that you had before – but an advert trying to highlight those realities, and the difficulties women go through after birth, was rejected by the Oscars.

In contrast to the smiling-and-toned-mom-immediately-after-birth images often used in post-pregnancy advertising, advertisers Frida Mom released a commercial showing a mother waking up to a crying baby, stomach hanging over her pants, and struggling with a pad in her mesh underwear. That advert was rejected by the broadcaster ABC and the Oscars for being “too graphic with partial nudity and product demonstration”.

So-called “women’s issues” are always handled with kid gloves – from the bizarrely colored blue liquids used in period commercials which supposedly represent blood (which is, er, red) – to “empowering” breastfeeding ads which don’t even show boobs. So maybe we shouldn’t be surprised the ad didn’t make the cut.

But the decision has nonetheless been denounced by celebrities and campaigners. In an Instagram post, Frida Mom criticized the decision, pointing out: “It’s not ‘violent, political’ or sexual in nature ... It’s just a new mom, home with her baby and her new body for the first time.” It ended on the note, “And we wonder why new moms feel unprepared.”

Actor Busy Phillips said the advert “accurately represents something millions of women know intimately”, before calling out the Academy out for missing out on an opportunity to normalize women’s bodily experiences after pregnancy. “I’m so fucking sick of living in a society where the act of simply BEING A WOMAN is rejected by the gatekeepers of media,” she said in an Instagram post.

The Academy has yet to respond to the backlash. It did, however, put out stereotype-smashing ads in the past, showing that women can play pool and drink beer. Radical, right? Maybe the whole bleeding-after-birth thing is just a step too far.