Paul Martin has since apologised for the email. Photo / Supplied
Paul Martin has since apologised for the email. Photo / Supplied
An advertising executive's sexist email which ranked his female co-workers based on their attractiveness has gone viral.
Paul Martin, who recently resigned from his position as an executive at high-profile London advertising agency The & Partnership, sent a farewell email to his entire office on his last day on March8 — which also happened to be International Women's Day.
In the email, Mr Martin thanked his colleagues for "a fun couple of years" — but then proceeded to rank his female co-workers in a list of "top five" and "bottom five", based on their appearance.
He wrote that he would only find one woman attractive "after seven pints and a bag of pork scratchings".
When describing another woman, he wrote: "If you were the last girl on earth, I would use you as bait to trap a wild animal I would be happier f***ing."
Other shocking descriptions include: "After watching this video, I am forever flaccid", "I don't see the attraction tbh, but everyone else rates you, so you must be doing something right" and "You're having a baby now and three's a crowd. Sorry, you're missing out".
He explained that his ranking was "based solely on looks and has nothing to do with personality".
"If it were, there might be some right munters in there and that would defeat the whole point of trying to sexistly objectify people (on International Women's Day, of all days)," he said.
He signed off his email by saying he is heading to the pub after work, "And if anyone in my Top Five fancy leaving their partners and risking it all for a bit of 'mental', then my contacts are below and scrawled crudely across most public bathrooms."
The email was leaked online and quickly went viral.
It has been globally condemned, and his former firm issued a statement on Twitter slamming the text.
"We do not condone sexism of any kind at The & Partnership LDN," the post read.
"We've apologised to our staff and others for any offence this email has caused, and have taken action to make it clear to all employees that we will not tolerate emails of this kind being sent in future, by men or women."
Paul Martin apologised on Twitter.
Mr Martin has also posted a longwinded apology for the email which "understandably offended and upset many people" on his own Twitter page.
"First of all. I take full and sole responsibility for this and sincerely apologise for all offence this has caused," he wrote.
"This absolutely wasn't my intention and I am incredibly sorry.
"Sending these 'Top Five' emails has become common practice at many ad agencies, and by sending that email yesterday, I have contributed to the culture of toxic masculinity."
He explained the women mentioned in the email were "friends and people I very genuinely love" and that "the email was meant to be a stupid, ironic attempt to subvert and mock the sexist 'Top Five' emails that have been sent around agencies for many years".
But unsurprisingly, his apology was not well received within the Twittersphere, with iamstupidisco writing: "I'm fairly confident you will never work in advertising again. You absolute disgrace." And Fiona Pattison suggested Mr Martin "go and live in a cave" as a result of his faux pas.
It is not known whether Martin has found new employment.
