Audi Ads and Rape Culture … new Super Bowl Ad Low

Alrighty then … I always know that televised football games never have the most enlightened ads if there is such a thing.  I don’t think I ever got enough expletives in my dictionary to deal with the Swedish Bikini Team.  Then, there’s every Go Daddy ad ever made.  I remember when my parents took me to see “In The Heat of the Night” in a theatre in Estes Park Colorado when I was a tender young thing.  Mom usually would find a way to get every one to a movie she wanted to see since the cabin was sans TV and none of my cousins were around to babysit so we got drug to some pretty intense movies.  The opening scene was a bare-breasted woman and my mother tried to strategically give me popcorn by placing the box in front of my face.  That’s always what I think about doing to any girls in the room during ads on sporting events if I happen to wrangled into being there.

So, Audi wins the prize for unbelievable … it’s the “Prom Ad”.  Jon Bois sums it up nicely

In this ad, a high school kid is going to the prom by himself. Bummer, bro. But his dad gives him the keys to his Audi. Hell yeah, bro. He cruises to the school and parks in the principal’s spot. Hell yeah, bro. He walks straight up to the prom queen and ambushes her with a kiss.

Hell yeah, bro. What you feel like doing at that particular moment is more important than whether or not she wants to be kissed. Hell yeah, bro. She appears to be in a relationship with someone else, and there is no implication offered in this commercial that this is something she would want. Hell yeah, bro. It turns out that she happened to be OK with it, thereby justifying everything. Hell yeah, bro. The commercial closes with, “Bravery. It’s what defines us.” Hell yeah, bro. The word for just walking up to a woman and kissing her without her consent is apparently, “bravery.” Hell yeah, bro.

Bravery?  Is that what they would call that?

Young and old dudes: Kissing women without their consent is not brave. It is sexual assault. That is all.

Go Daddy:  I really hope Anonymous take down all your servers permanently.