Snickers' Super Bowl ad, which depicted two mechanics eating a candy bar and accidentally kissing Lady-and-the-Tramp style, has brought fire from the left, where many viewers saw the ad as "homophobic."
Snickers responded in a NYT article, which I've copied from
Pandagon:
"As with all of our Snickers advertising, our goal was to capture the attention of our core Snickers consumer, primarily 18-to-24-year-old adult males," said a spokeswoman for Masterfoods, Alice Nathanson. "Feedback from our target consumers has been positive, and many media and Web site commentators on this year's Super Bowl lineup ranked the commercial among this year's best."
Yeah, that's a pretty pathetic response, and if you want, you can rip it apart (if you have that kind of time). As for me, I'd rather help them write.
It should've included something like this:
"It's not homophobic to make fun of the ignorance rampant in heterosexual society, as this commercial does. Put two insecure males in an awkward, homoerotic situation, and they will react awkwardly. That's the concept. If anything, the ad makes fun of the lengths to which insecure, grown men will go to assert their heterosexuality. Yes, the two men use the term 'manly,' because the terms 'manly,' 'macho,' and 'masculine' are often used to indicate heterosexual traits, and only with the passage of time and evolution of the English language will any of that change. Debate that if you like amongst yourselves, but don't take up a queer theory debate with a candy bar company. Here, two mechanics (
stereotypically a heterosexual male occupation) are ripping out chest hair and inflicting pain upon themselves, as though a high tolerance for pain is indicative of uber-heterosexuality. It's ridiculous, of course, and that's where the humor originates. Inferring some sort of anti-gay agenda is short-sighted. If anything, this makes fun of heterosexual society's rampant insecurities, especially among men who are doing things that are traditionally 'manly,' such as working in a garage. Where is the outrage from heterosexual males who don't work in garages or rip out their chest hair to assert masculinity? Moreover, where is this kind of outrage during prime-time television and major motion pictures, which convey similar messages with alarming regularity?"
Snickers might not be that eloquent, but that doesn't make them anti-gay.
Snickers' acknowledgement of the subjective nature of humor is a good call -- and it doesn't matter what the joke, someone will be offended. This is a prime opportunity for GLBT organizations to use a high-profile ad for their own grandstanding.
That's why you don't see this kind of flap after a film such as
Orgazmo becomes a cult hit, with its catch phrase, "I don't wanna sound like a queer or nothin'," or when Eddie Murphy's dated HBO special
Delirious hits DVD stores this week, with innumerable occurrences of the word "faggot" and the implication that one can contract AIDS by kissing a homosexual man, and then pass AIDS to another person by kissing someone else, among other 1980s viewpoints that remain popular to this day among the more ignorant members of society.
Where's the outrage from the GLBT community? Oh, it's watching commercials. If I were gay, I'd be pissed that people who were supposed to stand up for my rights were instead pissing and moaning about some forgettable Super Bowl ad that doesn't even take an anti-gay stance so much as comment on homophobia. Then I'd wonder why Eddie Murphy's DVD is selling so well.
Yeah, Snickers should've put more into their message. But yeah, there's ignorance on both sides of this one.
Now the football players' reactions that appeared on the Snickers Web site? That's worth shouting over, but let's be clear about the target. Are we targeting Snickers for facilitation, or are we targeting the homophobia rampant in professional sports? Because really, what's more impactful?
