I think this buys into the idea that women actually get some pleasure out of servicing a man (yes, I realize that some women actually do enjoy it).  This isn’t a case of “sex sells” because this isn’t sex.  It represents an act where one partner gets off and the other doesn’t.  However, I wonder if this type of ad would be counter-productive.  Not only would a lot of women and men be offended by it, but it might turn away men who are sensitive about anything that could seem gay (which is a lot of men).

I’m just agog with admiration and overcome by lust by just seeing your <strike>dick</strike> burger.  *headsmack*

I think this buys into the idea that women actually get some pleasure out of servicing a man

Sex is mostly in the brain, not the genitals.  I get a lot of pleasure out of “servicing” my partner, whether there is reciprocation or not.  If servicing one’s partner is not a pleasurable experience, one might be doing it wrong (or with the wrong person). 

That said, the ad would have been funny with a bearded, balding bear (especially in Singapore).

Not only would a lot of women and men be offended by it, but it might turn away men who are sensitive about anything that could seem gay (which is a lot of men).

That’s the same conclusion I came to when I saw it last week. The burger is obviously aimed at young guys, probably the kind who travel in packs and are hypersensitive about being perceived as gay. So how long before the one who orders it gets hammered by his fellow doodz for “taking a whole seven inches in his mouth” or something equally homophobic? Not long, that’s for sure.

It’s a sandwich commercial.  A tasteless, low brow, embarrassingly bad sandwich commercial, but just a sandwich commercial all the same.  I’m sure someone swung by an In-and-Out Burger joint and had a massive brain fart.  But I wouldn’t give this any more attention than it deserves.  I also try to stay the hell away from fast food in general.  :-p

Anyone impressed by that so called “sandwich” needs to take $5 and head over to Subway.

Mmm - to what extent *can* Burger King in Florida dictate the advertising of the franchisee in Singapore?  I assume we’re talking about a regional grouping here.

To be honest, my first impression was that she was gaping in amazement, not preparing for full sandwich penetration.

Meanwhile, the five dollar foot long meme is burning up the teen world, at least from what I’ve seen at home.

Is this the same singapore that bans gum chewing and jails people for failing to flush toilets and is obsessed with totalitarian order?

I thought so.

Uh, seriously, shouldn’t this be way down on the fucking priority list of things to get pissed about?  I mean a regional ad in Singapore?  What other companies did you scrutinize before deciding on this one Pam.

None of which is meant to imply you’re wrong here.  You’re not.  You’re dead on (though a couple of the comments are bit disturbing).

In the end, I think I’m going to focus on drilling my reps on the public health care option and holding the guy I voted into the big chair into keeping his promises about equal right for all citizens, not just the ones who are approved of by the white house office of faith based initiatives.

Seriously though, that ad is fucking out there bad on so many levels.

I recall Domino’s testing a new pizza a long time ago.  No shit, it was called

“The 15” All Meat Dominator”

Yeah, those catholics have some issues.

I’m just not inferring forced sodomy from this ad.

Crude? Sure. Stupid? Oh yea. Reductive? Indeed.

But to advertising drones crude, stupid and reductive are features, not bugs.

We are talking about Burger King here, the chain that launched the musical “I AM MAN” campaign with fratboys balking at ‘chick food,’ strongmen sneering at the camera and a minivan being tossed off a bridge.

Oh, and what Dan said.  BK lowered the standards for their food a long time ago.  It only makes sense that their advertising would follow.

Homophobia didn’t occur to me here. I figured young guys would associate the sandwich with women sucking their cocks, and it would therefore be a huge hit with them. It’s grossing me out how scared the woman looks, but I guess that’s supposed to be part of the fun for misogynists. I suppose it might hurt sales if they have her look like she’s enjoying it.

So how long before the one who orders it gets hammered by his fellow doodz for “taking a whole seven inches in his mouth” or something equally homophobic? Not long, that’s for sure.

Yeah, good point. I can see an ad like this getting their attention enough to get them in the door of Burger King, at least, even if they end up ordering Whoppers instead.

Man, I can’t tell whether that’s a real woman photoshopped to look like a mannequin/blow-up doll or a RealDoll-type mannequin.  Fucking creepy-ass porned-up ads.

I don’t get how this is even supposed to be an *ad*.

Imagery of women giving blow jobs is not attractive to women. While it may well be pleasurable to give a partner pleasure, and there are probably some women who enjoy it the way some het men (and for that matter, gay women and bi men and women) enjoy sucking on breasts, imagery of women and blow jobs is *so* universally coded as degrading, I find it hard to imagine any woman being turned on by depersonalized blow job imagery like this. And since men are not the hamburger, men looking at this must either put themselves in the place of the burger, which is going to get eaten, or the woman, who is apparently going to give the burger a blow job. Guys who identify with the burger don’t buy the burger and eat it, and guys who feel like the ad is making them identify with the woman will either have a homophobia panic or will feel degraded the same way women would.

When sex sells, the idea is supposed to imply that if you buy the product, you can have sex with the attractive person selling it, or become like the attractive person selling it and get other people to want sex with you. Setting up a message to imply that the attractive person is having sex *with* the product, not with you, seems counterproductive, and if you add that the attractive person is being degraded by the choice of imagery used, then it doesn’t sell on the level of “be the attractive person”, either.

Also, the woman only looks happy if you interpret her expression as pleasant surprise at the burger. If the expression is sexual and she’s preparing to give a blow job, she looks kind of like she’s steeling herself for it. The difference between “Wow, that thing is so huge, how can I get it all in my mouth?” when it’s *food* and you are consuming it versus when it’s a man’s penis and you’re servicing it is pretty, well, enormous.

But I’m really sensitive to shit like this. I started biting my hot dogs in half long before I started hearing immature boys telling blow job jokes when girls eat hot dogs, but I gotta say I felt positively gleeful about chomping my dogs in half in front of guys who were doing that.

junk science:

absolutely on the no-enjoyment part. It would have been a whole different ad if the woman had had a look of pleasurable anticipation on her face. (And an overlapping but significantly different set of people would have been complaining.) Also, it seems pretty clear that BK intended the ad to go viral, even if their target market in singapore is largely westerners.

What struck me was “how unoriginal”.  There was a crap-ass burrito joint on my way to work 15 years ago that used pretty much the same image.

Wait, this ad is supposed to appeal to women?  I thought it was 100% targeted towards men.

porn culture run amok. i blame howard stern.

seriously, how long have we got till all commercial culture is just straight-up (or even just bending to the side a little bit) porn?

That said, the ad would have been funny with a bearded, balding bear (especially in Singapore).

*snort*

Wait until you see the Hardee’s ad that’s running in Micronesia.

I’ll quietly refer you to another advertisement - this one for an online game featuring spaceships.

http://www.brokentoys.org/2007/10/27/there-may-be-some-subliminal-message-here/

Stay classy, advertising industry.  Stay classy.

The Eve Online ad makes even less sense because you hardly ever see an Eve avatar.  If sex sells, then it’s sex between space ships.  I suppose they’ll try anything short of lowering their monthly fee to get new people into the game.  Unfortunately, the kind of person who is going to look at that ad and want to buy the product is exactly the kind of person who will be bored to death by the game. Seriously, I know that companies think casual misogyny is the way to reach gamers, but that’s just lazy.

This is minor compared to other crap going on in the world right now.

Catgirl: People do actually get pleaasure from performing various acts on a partner. ((eyeroll))

If the ad ran in Singapore, why use a white woman? Isn’t Singapore mostly Chinese/Malay/Indian? There’s something intersectional going on here.

@ ice weasel: Yeah, it’s too bad Pam wasted her quota on blog posts commenting on an ad campaign in some non-American (re: unimportant) market.

seriously, how long have we got till all commercial culture is just straight-up (or even just bending to the side a little bit) porn?

This reminds me of the ads in Idiocracy, where the Fuddrucker’s family restaurant brand has morphed toward its logical conclusion.

That said, I do think this ad is an Internet-driven viral meant to generate buzz around the brand. Since their brand is marketed mainly to exurban teenagers with no taste, this won’t damage it too much.

If the ad ran in Singapore, why use a white woman? Isn’t Singapore mostly Chinese/Malay/Indian? There’s something intersectional going on here.

No there isn’t. Everyone knows that White women are THE pinnacle of womanhood.

I’m pretty sure Pam can talk about whatever she wants to on her own blog, and she has room in her brain for more than one thought. What the hell?

It’s really sad that hateful porn and casual misogyny make so many straight women not enjoy blowjobs. Giving head is the best damn thing in the world when you do it for someone who appreciates it and doesn’t mock you and think of you as less than human for doing it. How stupidly counterproductive.

It’s the expression on her face that makes this degrading.  That is shock with some fear mixed in.  That is domination.  That sandwich is your peen dominating that uppity bitch.  This ad is stupid on many levels, but I think deciding on that particular expression for the final ad was asinine.

“Yearn for more”?  Seriously?  That’s the look of someone who is being forced to give this blow job and just wants the shit over with.  If they are trying to sell this like sex for your mouth, they might have tried making the woman look like she actually wanted to do it.

The ad is misogynistic and counterproductive, if you ask me.  Unless you’re some kind of sociopath who would get off on forcing a huge sandwich in the mouth of an unwilling partner.

And if the target audience is young men (which, if this sells to young men, girls, RUN), it’s completely asinine to take the chance of alienating fifty percent of your total market.  BK nimrods.

I’m not sure why the ad doesn’t say “Get ready for a hot beef injection!”

That would surely sell this to a lot of young homophobic males.

unlike yourself I doubt most women view these type of images as either degrading or controversial. They just feel the ad is not targeted to them.

Even if they don’t think of blowjobs as degrading, they still think of blowjobs as having nothing to do with them or their enjoyment. Fail, straight men. Utter fail.

You don’t steel yourself with your eyes wide open.

She looks terrified to me. Not sexy at all, but then I wouldn’t want someone going down on me to look like she were about to be tortured and killed. I just don’t get it.

The woman in the advert is not steeling herself for a Blow Job. You don’t steel yourself with your eyes wide open.

If you say so.  Still, she’s looking at the <strike>penis</strike> sandwich with “Oh my God, it’s so huge!” awe and “how am I ever going to fit that in my mouth?  My jaw is going to ache for days!” fear.  Whether she’s steeling herself at that very moment or just about to start, it’s rather splitting hairs.

I should clarify that I don’t mean all straight men, just the kind who get off on women being forced to give blowjobs they don’t want to give.

We’re a couple of old farts who totally love the $5 foot long at Subway.  We think pretty highly of Subway generally.

But Burger King?  Never!  Here in the northwest, those in the know know that the best burgers and everything else, including seasonal treats, are at Burgerville.  It’s where you go when you know. 

We are all excited because the word is that our town will be getting its own Burgerville soon.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/burgerville-usa-monmouth

Oh and PS—that ad is hilarious.  But it doesn’t look like a good way to sell food, especially since as far as I’ve seen a major component of their market is people with little kids.

I’ll quietly refer you to another advertisement - this one for an online game featuring spaceships.

That one seems a bit vagina dentata to me.

Older, nobody in my entire family wants to hear about that.  So unfair.

People do actually get pleaasure from performing various acts on a partner.

She acknowledges that. 

The problem - and others have pointed this out as well - is that blowjobs have been culturally constructed as servile acts.  Our culture-at-large (as opposed to the people at this blog and other feminists, who believe that women might actually have sexual urges of their own) still sees sex as a man “conquering” a woman - overcoming her defenses and “scoring”.  A blowjob even moreso, because the woman doesn’t receive the stimulation she would during vaginal intercourse.  The act is purely in service to the man’s pleasure (anal sex, which is very likely to hurt if it’s done even a little bit wrong, is supposedly the ultimate example).  This perception carries through all the way from the 14-year-old blowing her boyfriend in order to please him while retaining her virginity (and not, of course, to explore sex in a way that seems a bit safer to her) to face-fucking gag-porn. 

(Note that the paragraph above uses strictly heterosexual examples.  It’s this perception of penetration as conquest that messes so many people’s heads up when it comes to gay men.  A straight man performing cunnilingus on his partner isn’t being penetrated/conquered, so eating pussy isn’t seen as a servile act the way a blowjob is, even if it’s still a non-reciprocal, “servicing” type of sex act.  But the idea that a man might volunteer to be penetrated?  Like a woman?  Totally screws with their worldview.)

So, to sum up all this ramble: the fact that some people enjoy giving blowjobs for whatever reason, or who are at least glad to do so as part of a mutually respectful, fulfilling relationship, is beside the point.  The perception is that blowjobs are servile and degrading, which is the perception that this ad, with its frightened-looking model staring at the huge chunk of meat moving inexorably toward her mouth, is playing on.

(her mouth which is too small for said huge chunk of meat, btw)

I work in Singapore for most of the year, and I’m surprised that this ad ran there.  The place tends to be a little more buttoned-down than the West, partly because the dominant Chinese culture is fairly conservative. 

Anyway, even if you were just trying to appeal to young heterosexual men, “Eating our burger is like sucking a seven inch cock” isn’t really the message I’d go for.

Um, Pam, you think that ad is bad? Look what Coca Cola is doing in Taiwan: they have a whole campaign based on portraying Africans as simpletons including one ad with a local comic in blackface. If you send in ten receipts of coke products, they’ll give you merchandise such as a visor with an afro attached (they actually called it a “black person head” hat.)

http://battlepanda.blogspot.com/2009/06/racist-cola.html

I know this isn’t big on the grand scheme of things. But, hey, we can walk and chew gum. American companies need to know they don’t get a pass for pulling this stuff as long as it’s outside the USA.

Battlepanda: Kola nuts come from Africa. Africans have kinky hair.

What’s your take on this classic commercial? Racist? Borderline? Or perhaps even OK?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JinBKqSCSac

I left out: an ice-cold coke is so cold it makes you shiver. Brrrrr!

What? That’s a non-sequitor. What does this have to do with Kola nuts?

Anyhow, I think what really pushes it wayyyy over the line is the part of the campaign where they (a) got a Taiwanese guy to dress up in blackface and mimic the africans in the ad. They are also asking people to send in their own videos, presumably while acting amusingly with their “black people head” hats.

Given BK’s contempt for its customers, as expressed in the fantastically low nutritive value of its offerings, this isn’t precisely out of character.

What does this have to do with Kola nuts?

Ah. I saw the commercial and thought Coca-Cola—Kola nuts—Africa.

But they were probably thinking Africa—hot—> Ice cold Coke—refreshing.

The blackface thing is complicated. Was the intent of the producer to be racist? If racism wasn’t the producer’s intent, was the commercial racist from the point of view of the observer of that race?

If Al Jolson does “Mammy” in the forest, and there is no black person to see it, is it still racist? What if he didn’t know any better?

Isn’t BK in Singapore a small brand trying to get attention?  When I was there a few years ago, McDs were everywhere, but I don’t remember seeing a single BK. 
Also, BK tv ads here have a really creepy vibe, and have for sometime.

“Also, BK tv ads here have a really creepy vibe, and have for sometime.”

Bizarre plasticine stalkers trying to feed you is only creepy if you object to any combination of “bizarre plasticine stalker trying to feed you.”

Hector,
I think it very clearly is racist. You can make the argument that the harm of this racism is reduced because there aren’t that many black people in Taiwan. But there are a lot of darker people in Taiwan who are discriminated against, and I think prejudice tends to breed prejudice.

There was a time when this was a clear joke.

The blackface thing is complicated. Was the intent of the producer to be racist? If racism wasn’t the producer’s intent, was the commercial racist from the point of view of the observer of that race?

Sigh. No, Hector.

One more time, because apparently there will always have to BE “one more time” explaining this to people:

Something doesn’t have to be made with racist or sexist intent for it to have a racist or sexist effect.

Also, no, “Africans” do not have “kinky hair”. “Africans” are not a monolithic race. “Africans” have all kinds of hair textures.

This ad doesn’t seem to be very well thought out.  It’s like they got so giggly about their Super Seven Incher and the awe-struck wonderment it would inspire in women—and, yes, it is very reminiscent of “choke on it” porn iconography—that they never quite figured out how to reconcile the “it’s so beefy and manly!” angle with the “men will want to eat it!” angle.  It seems pretty clear to me that the target audience is not, in fact, women, but it comes unraveled however you try to interpret it.

If the average dick was 14 inches I would be a confirmed lesbian.

The bugged eyes, plasticy pale skin and hyper red lips are more blow up doll than scared, or steeled.

I’m sure this is how a straight man reads it, but I cannot look at a real human woman and not attempt to interpret her expression on the basis of “what would cause me to make that face?” And I see shock, maybe fear… not happy anticipation.

The very *fact* that people can look at a real human woman and think “hyper-plasticized blow up doll” is part of the problem here.

If the average dick was 14 inches I would be a confirmed lesbian.

And with good reason.  I just measured on my wife (yes, as a matter of fact, she did look at me like I was crazy.  Why do you ask?), and 14 inches from her crotch comes out somewhere around her sternum.  Of course, since a vagina is angled up and back, a 14-inch penis would emerge somewhere from the small of her back.

Something doesn’t have to be made with racist or sexist intent for it to have a racist or sexist effect.

That’s pretty much what I thought I was saying. The most egregious problem is people who intend to be racist and are. But that doesn’t cover every racist thing. Racist acts, speech, etc. are in the eye of the beholder, so to speak. People who don’t mean to say/do something racist can be clued in, however.

But it’s true I don’t care about people who are vicariously offended. If women don’t think something I say is sexist, I don’t care what a hyperscrupulous male thinks.

no, “Africans” do not have “kinky hair”.

This is the sort of thing that typically only a hyperscrupulous white person would say.

If the average dick was 14 inches, would you still read horror?

Yes.  Her eyes are huge and frightened-looking, not heavy-lidded with arousal or closed in ecstatic pleasure.  Besides, the full length of the sandwich isn’t shown - it could be seven inches or a three-foot sub for all we know.  However, they make sure we can see that the sandwich is too thick for her mouth to comfortably accommodate (or it would be, if it was the cock it’s so blatantly supposed to represent instead of soft, squishy white bread).

I’m sure this is how a straight man reads it,

No, I feel safe in saying that most straight men would look at this ad and be well aware that they’re looking at a woman who’s a little bit scared of the big ol’ cock that’s about to get shoved in her mouth.  The only question is how they would feel about that.

Not sexy at all, but then I wouldn’t want someone going down on me to look like she were about to be tortured and killed. I just don’t get it.

I’m guessing her eyes are that wide open because it’s prettier than closed eyes, especially in profile.  Because I looked at that ad and one of my first thoughts was “she wouldn’t have to worry about getting the whole thing in her mouth so much if she were allowed to open her mouth all the way.”  But then her chin wouldn’t look so cute.  Try to reconcile “getting prepared to cram all seven inches in your mouth” with “pretty in profile” and you end up with “vaguely unsettling.”

I especially like how they put “IT’LL BLOW” in HHUUUGGGEEE letters right under the image, you know, in case it was too subtle for you.

Regarding the Taiwan commercial - I know that blackface automatically has racist connotations in the US because of its racist use in history, but this is something that is very rarely known outside the US. (My boyfriend, otherwise a very good English speaker, has just asked: Who is blackface?) I’m a bit more familiar with the history only because I’ve learned about it in my university American literature courses. I’m quite sure that the people in Taiwan have never heard of minstrel shows. I guess to them, it’s just “black people as tokens of exoticity”, which of course is stereotyping and can sometimes lead to nastiness. I’m just not sure these ads were meant or percieved as degrading in their target audience, though of course, I know little of race relations in Taiwan.

“If the ad ran in Singapore, why use a white woman? Isn’t Singapore mostly Chinese/Malay/Indian? There’s something intersectional going on here.”
yyzian on 07/01 at 11:17 AM

Something about her actually looks Asian to me, but I can’t really put my finger on why.  The face seems relatively flat compared to most European faces, and her nose seems relatively small.  She’s dyed blonde but her natural hair color is obviously a lot darker.  The makeup and/or Photoshopping is quite heavy.  She’s painted to look like an American farm girl, but that again doesn’t seem like her natural coloring.

All just based on generalities, of course, and I know there are American and European women who look like the model.  But I can’t shake the feeling she’s not American or European at all, just made to look that way.

She looks pretty white to me.  Plastered in makeup, yes, but Caucasian.

Between this and the Squarepants ad, I’m beginning to think Beavis and Butthead took over the commercial department at Burger King.