A really good summary of the majority of US Super Bowl commercials

[solarbird]

From fengi, here, via nihilistic_kid:

HAVING TO PRETEND THE FUCKHOLE IS HUMAN.

DOESN'T THAT SUCK?

DON'T BE A GIRL, BUY OUR SHIT.

The misogyny really was just laid out there this year. How horrible and emasculating it is not to be a total ass all the time; how if you're forced to choose between your automobile's tires and your wife, if you're a real man, you'll throw your wife out of the car in front of the guys with the guns and take off to save your automobile's tires from theft; how horrible and emasculating it is not to have a TV screen showing sports in your face at literally every moment.

(Which, if you analyse things even momentarily, also means you're not a real man if you're not a braying jackass, a coward who throws companions to the wolves while screaming off to save your own life, and a mindless consumer who spends most of his time staring at a portable television showing sports and sports ads. In other words, if you're not a baby having your whims catered to by the moment.)

This is deeply broken.

It's a shame, really. It was one hell of a championship, if you're into handegg. No, seriously, it was the best game I've seen in a while. It's not just the let's-start-the-second-half-with-an onsides kick call (which was brilliant, as was the cut to the Indianapolis coach literally gaping - spectacular directing work there), no; I really thought the quality of play up and down the field - but particularly of both offensive lines - was just marvellous. You really got to see two impressive coaches and teams at work here. From a game standpoint, that was nice.

Too bad about the pathetic, insulting packaging wrapped around it.

Comments

[solarbird]

Do you really think that isn't a response visited upon women? Really?

Also, see response below about frowning to Kirby.

[maellenkleth]

At some point, maybe at most points, simply walking away and disengaging is not a bad idea. Minding, though, that strategy may have to be backed-up with effective and concerted self-defense if the Neanderthal(s) in question decide to respond to that attempted disengagement by pursuit.

Hope I am making some sense; words are not coming easily today, which is a pity because this has been a subject of great personal significance over the years.

[kathrynt.livejournal.com]

Walking away and disengaging is not a bad idea for *yourself*. But it leaves the problematic structure intact. It's a good strategy if you don't need or expect things ever to change, but it does insure that things never will.

[maellenkleth]

I suppose that this all depends upon context. If the bad actor in question is someone within my close social milieu, then **yes**, quite agreed that engagement with the intention of fostering beneficial change is a better option, all other conditions being equal.

That especially obtains in the case of young people to whom I bear some duty of mentorship. There, I can imagine the possible future in which they rise to their own places of power and they deal more amenably and fairly with each other.

On the other hand, when dealing with strangers and passing acquaintances, there's the problem of limited resources, and a certain nagging sense on my part that even bothering to engage is somehow an enabling behaviour, where I risk being sucked into the dymnamic called "it's all about the man."

I'm really rather glad I missed yesterday's gladiatorial telethon. I probably actually had a better time at my Border Patrol interview than I'd have had sitting there in front of the teevee.

[kathrynt.livejournal.com]

No, see, I'm not talking about speaking to individuals. I'm talking about speaking to the larger structure involved. There's been a huge feminist response to these horrible ads, but while I've seen men complaining about them, I haven't seen any male response to them.

Where are the letters written to CBS and to each individual advertiser? Where are the letters written to the NFL? Where are the boycotts?

For that matter, you can engage without enabling. The frown is a great example of this. Some dude says something awful, your head shoots up, and you make a face, then go back about your business. All you need to do is not yield your space to the assholes.

[maellenkleth]

Thanks for the clarification: that is helpful.

I'm not terribly surprised by the lack of male response to those ads: I'm sure that their communicative dynamic is driven by a deeply-conditioned fear of looking weak or in some fashion un-male in the eyes of their imagined peer-group(s).

The example of the frown is indeed a good one, and something that is, here at least, so deeply-ingrained (right in there with the 'eww' vocalisation) that it slips recognition as being an element of behavioural change.

I do have to keep in mind the practical need to pick my fights; all the same, there is usually room for the situationally-appropriate behavioural encouragements, even if they are (most of the time) relegated to the status of secondary or lower communications objectives.

For what it may be worth, I do also see a difference between yielding my space and vacating a space which they may or may not have chosen to arrogate unto themselves -- I long since gave up on trying to inhabit the patriarchal space 24/7. That's not the same as separatism (although I did do that once); it's more about refusing to dignify some of their shitty behaviour, let alone being complicit in its social legitimation, by playing along in any way.

Given in the hopes that some of these words will make at least shards of sense; the topic is worthy of thought.

[clemtaur.livejournal.com]

"Do you really think that isn't a response visited upon women?"
Wait.. What? No, I think the violent response to disagreement that some folk have is not limited to males (or females) I feel that far more violence Is directed at women, whom a perpetrator would see as a safe(r) target..

I was responding to Loopback's cry of bullshit.. My personal experience, in rural areas, is that disagreements Can get violent. (on Any subject.. But sexual roles are an especially hot topic.)