News Flash: Superbowl Sexism

The Super Bowl is the biggest football game of the year--and the biggest television event as well. This year's game was the most-watched television broadcast in history. But the football game is not the only thing that viewers look forward to watching; the commercials are always an incentive to watch the big game. These commercials are supposed to be some of the most creative, funny, and whacky ads of the year. But a lot of them tend to be sexist—putting women down and putting men higher up on the pedestal than they already are.

There are the infamous commercials with half-naked women acting all sexy trying to convince men to buy a product that is often unnecessary. There are the GoDaddy commercials that always consist of hot women in tiny clothes. Then there is the Bridgestone tire commercial when a man trades in his wife for tires. So what Bridgestone is ultimately saying is that their tires are more valuable than your wife. It’s ridiculous. While these commercials may have been the favorites in the past, something about the rest of the Super Bowl commercials this year was different. The fan favorites, which viewers vote on after the game, were not the sexist and offensive commercials. Rather, viewers gushed over commercials like the Doritos ad and the Snickers commercial with Betty White, commercials that are far from offensive. Misogynist commercials were not even ranked in the top twenty favorite commercials of the Super Bowl. Could it be that times are-a-changing? I’m afraid the answer is no.

While the favorite Super Bowl commercials were not the ones with half-naked women, the inappropriate commercials that belittle women were still shown on national television. Stuart Elliott, a columnist for The New York Times, wrote, “And women were objectified by the likes of Bridgestone, Bud Light, GoDaddy, Motorola and Vizio (Elliott).” Here are Elliott’s reviews of specific Super Bowl commercials: “BRIDGESTONE One commercial had a misogynistic punch line -- a driver gives up his wife rather than his tires -- that was reminiscent of last year's sour, stereotypical spot about a talkative wife (Elliott).” “GODADDY As tired and pointless as the ''sexy'' spots for GoDaddy were, CBS deserves plaudits for rejecting a commercial the company also wanted to run that some found homophobic. Shame on channels like Comedy Central for accepting the awful ad (Elliott).” These commercials show that we are still very much in the midst of Raunch Culture whether we choose to accept it or not. So just because people didn’t vote the racy commercials to the top of the charts doesn’t mean that our society is changing for the better. In fact, it may just be getting worse. It doesn’t really matter that the Super Bowl commercial favorites weren’t the ones with undressed women; it matters more that there are the commercials with the barely clothed women in the first place.

The Bud Light commercial for this year ' s Super Bowl showed a bunch of people stranded on an island after their plane had crashed. A young woman ends up finding the radio from the airplane and thinks she can make it work and eventually get everyone off the island. A second later a man interrupts her and says he found the Bud Light that was kept in the plane's beverage carts. Everyone immediately flocks toward the man and the beer, completely forgetting about the woman and what she had said. Next thing you know there’s a beach party on the island and once the woman gets the radio to work, a man comes over and basically uses it as a turntable for music—displaying that a man’s wants are more important than a woman’s wants. So while the commercial was an advertisement for beer, it also implied that if people had the choice, they would listen to a man and follow what he does rather than listen to a woman and follow what she does. The woman in the commercial was entirely clothed but sexism was still very much apparent for the duration of the commercial. Why did Bud Light find it necessary for the woman to be in charge of the radio and the man to be in charge of the beer? Is it because they believe that men are superior and dominant when compared to women? That people choose to listen to men over women when they have the choice? That’s what this undeniably sexist commercial is telling us.

The notorious, extra-raunchy GoDaddy commercials always involve extremely attractive women who usually end up with their clothes off. This year, Danica Patrick, the race-car phenomenon, asked the women who were “interviewing” her, how hot is too hot? Once this question is asked, one of the interviewees says in a seductive voice, “I can show you exactly how hot is too hot for TV.” The woman then proceeds to take down her hair, swing her head in a circle and rip off the suit jacket she was wearing to expose a tight GoDaddy tank top. The commercial wasn’t funny or clever or even the slightest bit creative; all it did was display attractive women.

Why did Danica Patrick feel the need to be in this commercial? Does she feel that she needs to prove to people that she is a woman despite the fact that she races cars with men? Patrick has given into Raunch Culture big time. Ariel Levy, the author of Female Chauvinist Pigs, would absolutely agree. Levy comments on Raunch Culture, “This is our establishment, these are our role models, this is high fashion and low culture, this is athletics and politics, this is television and publishing and pop music and medicine and—good news!—being a part of it makes you a strong, powerful woman. Because we have determined that all empowered women must be overtly and publicly sexual, and because the only sign of sexuality we seem to be able to recognize is a direct allusion to red-light entertainment, we have laced the sleazy energy and aesthetic of a topless club or a Penthouse shoot throughout our entire culture (26).” By starring in the GoDaddy commercials Patrick is supporting Raunch Culture; she is accepting and practically agreeing with the way in which society portrays women these days. She’s always been respected for her racing; no one made her do this. She most likely chose to do this because it would make her feel more feminine or make her more appealing and relatable to her audience. Whatever her motive was, it wasn’t a good one.

Riddle me this--if a sexy, built, handsome man was to star in a commercial with very few clothes on why is it that the product will not sell the same as it would if a woman with skimpy clothes was to advertise the same product? In my eyes, it’s because of the way we are taught to see things these days. Women are seen as a product, a way to sell things. But how did the view of women get so skewed? Why does a woman need to be a sexual object? Why can’t we do things with our clothes on? Viewers of the Super Bowl liked commercials when people had clothes on a hell of a lot more than they did when people had their clothes off. Maybe people are trying to tell our culture something—either that people are sick of the sexist commercials or more likely that people aren’t fazed by the sexist commercials anymore, that they don’t really see anything wrong with them, they’ve simply gotten used to them, they’ve chosen to give into the stereotypical ways in which men and women are portrayed.

So just because the Super Bowl favorites weren’t the ones that consisted of partially naked women doesn’t mean that our culture is on the right track to achieving gender equality. If society gets used to sexism, it will eventually be too late to turn things around, to make things just and equal. We need to make changes and we need to make them now.