Meterosexuals out, manly heterosexuals in! From Miller Light and Old Spice to Brut and Arby’s, the return of demonizing pussy guys — whether they’re gay or just pansy breeders — is back and bigger than ever in American advertising. Please let Snickers re-air that Mr. T commercial!
that's gay
Finally, Advertising Returns to Bashing Men Without 100% Machismo Scores
Help make sure LGBTQ+ stories are being told...
We can't rely on mainstream media to tell our stories. That's why we don't lock Queerty articles behind a paywall. Will you support our mission with a contribution today?
Cancel anytime · Proudly LGBTQ+ owned and operated
tlrdevere
Why is all this stuff being interpreted as anti-gay? I don’t see it as anti-gay at all, and I’m not offended. If you want to say it’s an ignorant societal expectation for certain biological genders to fit into specific gender roles, that’s an interesting idea to explore. But it’s still not anti-gay.
nikko
@tlrdevere: What??! It’s anti-gay. Extremely offensive.
Syl
Gender roles suck. Some girls are masculine, some guys are feminine. A guy being effeminate =/= gay, or immoral or weak. It’ll be decades, if not centuries, before we get more sensible as a society about gender roles and the harm they do, especially to kids.
That said, Isaiah Mustafa is awesome, and a fellow comic nerd. I hope he gets cast as a Luke Cage :3
Shade
@tlrdevere: Well if we want to be really precise it’s misogyny. The ads are saying that acting in any way feminine is bad, the subtext to most of these is that acting feminine means you’re gay.
And if some straight guys want to buy into that toxic, demeaning BS that will keep them eternally questioning their self worth by measuring themselves against some ridiculous phallic yardstick then they can have it. The guy who has to be better than the sissies is never going to be able to completely relax into his own space.
I’ll just crank the volume on my Cher album, slather on some moisturizer and not waste any amount of time worrying what Mr T will think.
Hear, hear
@tlrdevere: I couldn’t agree with you more. First off, no interest groups run around wetting themselves if an ad campaign, television program, etc., refers to certain types of men as cave men, or some such. Second, no one in these ads has suggested that gays are sissies. Gay-rights organizations would rightly have a complaint if such a suggestion were made. It hasn’t been. In fact, the argument that this ad is anti-gay can make sense only if those complaining start from the premise that gay guys either aren’t or can’t be masculine/macho, and in fact are sissies.
That’s a fascinating result. The crowd that’s complaining are, by and large, the same crowd that perpetually accuse any gays who disagree with them of “internalizing homophobia.” In this case, however, it is quite clearly they who have internalized pernicious attitudes and stereotypes about gays.
axos
The interesting thing is that, according to surveys, the super macho hetero males are not attractive to hetero women. Women like a little sissiness, a little flexibility. So why are they so busy staying on this track, anyway? In the end – who are most attracted to them?
thedarkchariot
@Shade:
Agreed. Reinforcing gender roles is always, at best, primitive. But there is further (gray, and you can argue how gray, but it’s still there) subtext that bashes the LGBTQ community.
Men for the most part are not allowed to be feminine. The great irony is that the ideal man is still attractive (look at the abs on the Old Spice guy). So while men (including straight men) are expected to be like that, they cannot have any hint of self-grooming or care. It’s really a sad catch-22.
ForeverGay
HATERosexual males form their identity from what they are not like being gay or a girl. It’s a constant battle for haterosexual males to maintain their identity by attacking others. Bryan Safi did a great job, this episode is definitely one of his best.
Hilarious
@axos: That’s total BS. Most women don’t like “metrosexual” behavior at all and a great many while gay-friendly don’t want their man to be even slightly mistaken as gay.
Totally understandable and not one bit unreasonable.
That said I laughed my ass off at the Old Spice commercial when I saw it so I’m really not sure what there is to be upset about.
Being gay and being feminine are two totally different things so I really don’t see why these discussions always include them together as if the words are interchangeable.
There’s really nothing offensive about any of this. Companies have just as much right to advertise to masculine males as they do the very few feminine males who even bought into the “metrosexual” thing to begin with. Which I have to add the “metrosexual” blitz of advertising that was being forced on us NEVER caught on, not even slightly. Only Hollywood bought into it and even then it’s only been laughed at by most. You had to have seen the many jokes comparing celebrity men to lesbians by now.
Bill
Very, very typically heterosexual.
Not a single consideration of the gay citizens they degrade in their attempts to degrade each other.
Stay classy, heterosexuals.
Stay classy.
Dawson
If only. I would kill to see the death of the meterosexual movement. Its about time real men make a come back. Meterosexuals just aren’t hot. Men should look like me. Also, to believe assaulting meterosexuals is the same as assaulting gay men you first have to believe that all gay men look like meterosexuals, and thankfully there are still a lot of gay men that actually look like men.
Dawson
@axos: Outdated studies. What women/men are attracted to changes every generation, and women are much more attracted to manly men now than they were in the 1990s-early 2000s. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy would not be remotely successful in the current culture.
Andrew
@Hear, hear: I’ve always been against the stereotype that all gay men are gender queer. Why? Cause stereotypes, of which gender roles are, suck no matter what or whom they are stereotyping.
That being said, denying the fact that a larger amount of feminine men or non-gender conforming people in the world are LGBT is idiotic. The LGBT community has a very large population of Gender Queens, — or Kings, as the case may be, and we should embrace this and include the fight against gender roles in our community, — whether or not you happen to fit into them by choice or not.
Andrew
@Dawson: Fuck you. Give me one good reason why I should conform to your standards? ONE good reason? You state that there is still a plentiful supply of men whom fit your standards, so why should it bother you if other people don’t feel inclined to your mannerisms? I wouldn’t call myself either a manly guy or a gender queen, — I do whatever the hell I like and really don’t care if it fits this generations vision of gender.
Jai
@ Hilarious
“Being gay and being feminine are two totally different things so I really don’t see why these discussions always include them together as if the words are interchangeable.”
Are you seriously that naive? Get real. Most people who look at femme guys automatically think GAY. Yes, gay and feminine are 2 different things. That I agree. But let’s face it, most people who look at a swishy dude in short-shorts speed walking and wiggling his ass in that Snickers commercial are not going to think “Hey, that’s a femme straight dude.” They’re going to think “Hey, look at that fag! Ha! Ha! Funny!”
Plus that quote goes against this other one you made.
“@axos: That’s total BS. Most women don’t like “metrosexual” behavior at all and a great many while gay-friendly don’t want their man to be even slightly mistaken as gay.”
All axos said that most women like a little sissiness, not gayness dude.
harpy
Thank God the hetero-meterosexual man is about to die off. Finally, being beautiful and cultured can go back to being queer male territory. The presumption of sophistication some of these glorified turkey-basters had was so offensive. Go back to your suburban, dingy breeding holes where you hetero males can rut in your over carb-ed, over protien-ed flannel lives with women who are worth way more than your man-child codependent ass.
Sigh, leave real society to fags and fairies.
eagledancer
My goodness–silly me–I had read the ad(s) as being ironic. Must be due to an overdose of Stephen Colbert…
Incidently, National Public Radio has done an interview with the actor, Isaiah Mustafa, who seems like a great person to know in “real life.”
http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2010/07/02/128266576/beautiful-old-spice-man-returns-to-charm-ladies-smell-delicious-serve-cake
BenR
Do comment-writers even bother reading what they’ve written? Do they even think about it as it’s flying from their fingertips onto the screen?
Or is today just National March of the Trolls day?
axos
I stick to my guns. The study I read came about one year ago or maybe two, and actually neither straight males OR females preferred the super macho, square (and may I add humor-free), musclebound male. They’re too heavy on their feet and maybe too slow in their heads to be really fun to be around in or out of bed. Have you ever seen a straight woman getting all wobbly-kneed in the vicinity of a body-builder? I haven’t.
BenR
@axos: What I’ve heard seems ambiguous. Based on the studies I’ve read and seen (which may or may not be reliable, but seem to be all over the place), straight women are more immediately, physically attracted to “manly” men, or men with stereotypically masculine features. When asked who they would prefer for a life partner or to help them raise children, however, they almost universally prefer men with more gender ambiguous physical features, which are allegedly biological markers for a man with a more caring, nurturing, and stable personality.
axos
@BenR: So what you’re saying is that for straight women there is a one night stand type of guy, and a marriage material guy?
Hilarious
@Jai: What exactly are you arguing here?
You think advertisers should only be allowed to show flamboyant feminine men? Are you saying we should play to stereotypes that all gay men are feminine in commercials because that’s how bigots see us?
I mean I’m trying to understand how what you posted remotely relates to the article and topic at hand.
You also grabbed one sentence and purposely used it out of context to twist my words.
Where exactly are you going in terms of this topic? Or are you just looking to make it an off-topic masculine versus feminine argument?
FYI gay men come in a variety of behaviors just like straight men. You’re the one being naive if you think all gay men are feminine or that masculine men shouldn’t be marketed to.
I’ll say again nothing about an ad aimed at “macho men” is offensive at all. It’s flat out silly to even pretend to be offended by that Old Spice ad of all things.
Have a tantrum over something else. This ain’t cuttin’ it.
jason
I wouldn’t be surprised if the firm behind this ad consists of breeder males who wank off to lesbians. Just goes to show what morons they are. Oh, and they probably vote Democrat too.
Sergio
Can I just say that I bet if this was on Univision or Telemundo everyone would be screaming about how Latino/as are stuck on gender roles / Machismo. Just trying to point out how ridiculous double standards. If a white person pulls this shit it isn’t a “cultural thing,” but if it happens to be a person of color all the gays start screaming. I’m so over it.
slobone
Well that’s a minute and a half of my life I’ll never get back (that’s how much I watched before I realized the guy is a total moron)…
TJ
Some of you are really annoying. THIS IS NOT ANTI-GAY. I usually like That’s Gay, but this one is really dumb and once again feeds the stereotype that gay=feminine. These commercials are kinda funny (the Old Spice one is great) but most are dumb and annoying; however, none are anti-gay. That’s a ridiculous and COMPLETELY unwarranted stretch. Somehow no one would be offended if every gay guy in a beer commercial was shown as really feminine; I would.
eagledancer
btw, maybe I’ve been on vacation and missed the outrage over Miller Light’s “Man Up” series of commercials:”The Miller Lite Pilsner taste is being promoted in a series of five television commercials with the tag line, “Man Up”. In each of the ads a man with no preference for taste in his beer is provided with a bland no-name brew when he orders a light beer from an attractive female bartender. The men are told to come back when they’ve lost their girly accessories, whether that be their “carry all”, skirt, panties, antique or lower back tattoo. “Man up,” a voiceover urges on each spot, “because if you’re drinking a light beer without taste, you’re missing the point of drinking beer.”
The newest commerical shows a man wearing a thong and ordering the “wrong” beer.
http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2010/miller-lite-man-up/
Queer Supremacist
@harpy: Finally, another heterophobe. I was getting a little lonely.
@eagledancer: Miller Lite needs to be rebranded as “Bob Uecker’s piss”.
@Dawson: Real men suck and fuck each other. Hard.
BenR
@axos: Sounds like that’s so, yeah. Sort of like the alleged superiority of Pepsi over Coke in blind taste tests. It is statistically true that people tend to prefer Pepsi over Coke on their first sip because it has a sweeter flavor. Preference for the taste of Pepsi wanes as the amount of sips increases, though, because most people tire fairly quickly of the taste of too much sugar.
The majority of consumers continue to buy, drink, and feel more product loyalty to Coke in larger quantities in spite of the blind taste test results, because not everything in life is about initial responses or instant gratification – Coke, like androgynous men, has a greater ability to sustain a person’s interest over a longer period of time.
But, of course, human beings are not monolithic and there is a plethora of tastes out there. Personally, I prefer a good homemade ginger ale and a smart, sassy lady.
David Ehrenstein
Bryan RULES!
Nothing gets a gay comment section going off the rails like posters braying about how straight-acting-straight-appearing REAL gay men are.
Kudo
This video promotes the gay agenda, but at the same time, it defends proper straight men. The curious thing about the faggot who made this video is that he tends to be realistic: he does actually show what kind of miserable beings faggots are, and that people don’t like such disgraceful, creepy, sissy buttfuckers.
One thing is for sure, the gay plague is a serious problem that threatens the wellbeing of mankind. It’s not until the law, politics and society sees them as inferior, disgusting, harmful parasites that ought to be trampled, or until all LGBT people are dead, that we can finally have some hope that mankind will not destroy itself.
Alex
@ForeverGay:
I remember reading about some lecture where this woman asked people to list ‘manly’ traits, and a majority of the traits were things that were specifically un gay.