February 5, 2007 3:53 PM

Things that make you go "Hmmm...."

Snickers Superbowl Web site promotes violence against gays and lesbians

When I first saw this during yesterday’s, I actually thought it was sort of cute, in a “101 Dalmations” sort of way. At the time, I had no idea that it was anything more than an individual commercial. As it turns out, Snickers has set up a web site devoted not only to this one commercial, but also the other three in the series. As you might imagine, given that the Mars family is one of the wealthiest and most virulently Republican in the nation, it’s not exactly a celebration of tolerance. While I would stop short of accusing Snickers of promoting violence towards gays, they certainly are going out of their way to flog old stereotypes in an attempt to sell candy bars. The fact that this promotion involves NASCAR doesn’t exactly belie that reality of what the target demographic is (ignorant, fear-driven, homophobic males?).

It’s disappointing, though not altogether surprising, seeing this sort of thing in a time when we allow ourselves to think that we’ve come a long way from the “bad old days”. Whether or not you’re gay, these ads are disturbing simply because they’re using fears and stereotypes of a class of people as a means to generates laughs and sell product. Yes, I suppose the ads are clever and humorous if you don’t stop to actually think about the message being sent. That’s exactly what makes this sort of thing so disturbing. A major multinational corporation is using advertising to ridicule and belittle an entire class of individuals based on societal fears, prejudices, and misconceptions. How sad is that? Regardless of how you feel about homosexuality, finding humor at the expense of another human being is just plain despicable.

Something tells me that we haven’t heard the last of this….

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on February 5, 2007 3:53 PM.

So how long before the Religious Right goes nuclear over this?? was the previous entry in this blog.

The definition of oxymoron: "Liberal Republican" is the next entry in this blog.

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