I'm tired of the war talk: 2003 Feminist Super Bowl AdWatch

Kyle_Wilson · February 12, 2003, 9:05am

Not that the blathering women conversation isn’t entertaining, but the entry that really baffled me in NOW’s list was

#66: Anheuser-Busch — Guy in clown suit drinks beer

“Gay bashing … no need to make a homosexual joke in order to sell a product.”

Okay, I haven’t gone back and watched the ad again, so maybe I missed something the first time. But where’s the gay bashing in a guy drinking a beer through his ass?

anonymous_user · February 12, 2003, 1:57pm

I was wondering the same thing at first but I think they’re referring to the point in the ad where he asks for a hotdog.

anonymous_user · February 12, 2003, 4:10pm

Tyjenks and Jack, I envy you two. Every good woman is either taken or a bear.
Anders: Main difference between men and women: men say what they mean. It’s VERY rare to find a woman who doesn’t play those games:
‘Sweety can I do this?’
‘Yes’
(depending on the situationg ‘yes’ can mean ‘yes’, ‘no’, ‘yes but you have to ask me’, ‘no, unless you ask me’, ‘maybe later’ or any number of other possible answers.
‘Okay’ (guy walks off completely oblivious to the fact that the female will pout for the rest of the week and refuse to tell why, and reserve the right to bring up violation at any future point to win an argument.)
guy finally notices woman pouting
‘Sweety you ok?’
‘I’m fine’
‘You sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh, ok.’ guy resumes doing whatever
‘You don’t care about me!!’
And so on.
Are you female? Cause I can only picture a female not seeing the huge difference.

#6: Yahoo’s HotJobs.com ? Workers sing about rainbows

“Excellent diversity!!!”

Holy crap FOUR exclamations! Now I wished I’d have seen these commercials!
Note to self: Singing about rainbows=quality

Anders_Hallin · February 12, 2003, 4:51pm

Nah, I’m a guy. [size=1]Though there are those pictures…[/size]
And before you ask, I have four quite close female friends. And I can’t deny that there is a difference in male and female behaviour, but I find those to be effects of a social construction, and often really really stupid.

Kyle_Wilson · February 12, 2003, 9:38pm

I think that’s kind of a stretch, but I guess NOW members are mostly liberal arts types, and all into that symbolism stuff.

Sometimes a hot dog is just a hot dog.

anonymous_user · February 12, 2003, 10:47pm

You’re right, but in the context of the commercial it wasn’t. The peoples reaction when he asked for the hot dog was pretty clearly meant to mean something other than a tasty snack. Kind of like the horses playing football commercial had the cowboy calling the ref a jackass, and the guy said “Actually, he’s a Zebra.”

I saw an interview with the producer of Sex & The City not long ago and he said that network TV is all about how close you can get to being lewd, that’s where all the comedy is.

Anyway, I’m sure that what I describe above is pretty close to the position NOW has on the ad. I still think it was great though.

Kyle_Wilson · February 13, 2003, 5:44am

The funny thing is, I don’t think there’s any way they could have changed the ad that would have made NOW happy. I think that if everyone else in the bar had clapped and cheered as the clown devoured his hot dog, NOW would have been pissed. I think that if it had been a female clown cramming hot dog after hot dog into a vagina-like maw, NOW would have been pissed. I think NOW just hates the hot dog.

Jack · February 13, 2003, 5:59am

Slightly OT: The Nature vs. Nurture debate certainly isn’t put to bed, but the study I mentioned in my previous post did prove that a significant amount of male vs. female differences are genetic. It’s very possible the social differences you see are a direct result of our fundamental behavioral differences.

You may now return to the topic of sexist ads in the Superbowl…

Anders_Hallin · February 13, 2003, 4:15pm

I don’t doubt there are differences, I mean, I don’t see me having a womb anytime soon. However, I question the relevance of such biological arguments in direct relation to the behaviour of people. I believe it is the response to the hormonal reaction which is taught by behaviour that is more influential to behaviour. And we get different hormonal reactions to situations based on what happened to us while we grew up (things like phobias and so on which causes huge reactions usually doesn’t come out of nothing).

I usually think that “biological feminists” are full of crap.

Jason_McCullough · February 13, 2003, 4:40pm

The funny thing is, I don’t think there’s any way they could have changed the ad that would have made NOW happy. I think that if everyone else in the bar had clapped and cheered as the clown devoured his hot dog, NOW would have been pissed. I think that if it had been a female clown cramming hot dog after hot dog into a vagina-like maw, NOW would have been pissed. I think NOW just hates the hot dog.[/quote]

I don’t know; I think they lost NOW when they made an ad about a guy anally drinking beer.

anonymous_user · February 13, 2003, 8:05pm

Obviously I wasn’t the only one to find this rich untapped comedy resource, Seanbaby chimes in:

Seanbaby:

The throbbing oppression of modern feminism by our dong-waving society.
The National Organization for Women Foundation has made some startling observations in their Watch Out Listen Up! 2003 Feminist Super Bowl AdWatch (www.nowfoundation.org/watchout3/superbowl.html). After careful analysis of every single Super Bowl commercial, this group of brave female commercial-watchers discovered that most advertisers resort to sexist jokes to sell their products. And it goes far beyond degradation to females. These women found reasons for all kinds of creeds and colors to start crying. Could the post-game riots have been started by the public’s outrage of seeing attractive women in beer commercials? Let’s take a look at some of the TNOFWF findings:

Commercial #69: Anheuser-Busch - Strongman contest

TNOFWF says, “Once again, women get to be window dressing, showing skin and reacting to men. Sexist and exploitative. Makes fun of weak, old, little people.”

Maybe it is time for all the weak, old, little people to get the respect they would have deserved were it not for all the things wrong with them. Still, this commercial is only offensive to women who take special care to get upset at the possibility of other groups getting offended. And even if through some miracle of whining it did enrage weak, old, little viewers, they’re not really in a position to start a respectable riot.

Commercial #72: Reebok - Linebacker Terry Tate roughs up the office

TNOFWF says, “Bad use of diversity. Stereotype of African American being used for his muscles in a position where he should be using his brains. Funny but excessively violent.”

No offense, ladies, but if a professional athlete is paid several million dollars to comedically trash an office for a shoe commercial and you’re busy accusing nearby ad executives of victimizing him because of the color of his skin, the African-American race might be looking for someone slightly less insane than you guys to be their cultural watchdogs.

Commercial #66: Anheuser-Busch - Guy in clown suit drinks beer

TNOFWF says, “Gay bashing… no need to make a homosexual joke in order to sell a product.”

If a person can’t make a homosexual joke in order to sell a product, then how in the hell am I going to get rid of all these pie-launching assless leather pants?