Addiction in Society

so, let me get this straight. white (not to mention, heterosexual) men make up 79% of the senate and are otherwise industry and national leaders right?

in fact, white men in the U.S. have been industry and national-political leaders for the entire history of this country, right? that fact has not changed significantly in the hundreds of years of this country's existence.

now considering the above, the depictions of white men acting foolish you mention are harmless compared to the representations of women and men of color in mainstream media. women are shown as sex objects - does one really have to think hard about how and why this can be more dangerous than representations of white men acting foolish? and black men and men of other races are often shown as criminals or violent deadbeats and rarely ever in leadership or positive roles.

if one really wants to get behind a cause, there are more serious representational issues that need to be dealt with than the undermining of white male supremacy in mainstream media. the representations you mention are hardly a threat to centuries of this supremacy.

To Stanton's blog, I say "Right on, Man."

While as a 47-year-old white man, I don't feel particularly persecuted - I am really tired of the "Homer Simpson" sterotype.

We are not all complete morons who can't take care of ourselves or perform tasks beyond lifting heavy objects. One of my favorite depictions is the father of the newborn who can't change a disposable diaper. You pull a tab, and tape the damn thing to the other side. Real difficult, huh? I probably changed thousands in my time. I also like to point out that before I met my lovely wife, I didn't starve to death and often had clean clothes to wear.

I work in an office full of passive aggressive women, and, at times, their snide treatment is laughable. But hey, I'm a middle-aged white guy. I'm not supposed to be insulted, right? We've ruled forever.

Hollywood, the ad industry, people of the world - can we just get beyond this image! Please.

And to all of you out there who hold on to this dim view of us - I encourage to to try talking to this neglected species known as the middle-aged white male. You may be shocked to see how you've underestimated us.

I've went on about this before myself. I think it's a sad state that advertising in most all ways has become demeaning to one group or another. This trend though started in sitcoms and the like. Shows with the well meaning but obviously stupid father that no one really listens to. Putting people down is the easiest form of comedy and everyone else is off limits.

To the person who said that this doesn't effect white male supremacy um I don't know what world you are in, but I am not superior to anyone I know. In fact there are a good number of people, of many different races, doing much better than I am. All of us white people aren't rolling in cash lording it over everyone. And just because we were at one time, doesn't mean we have to be treating like idiots to make up for it.

You gotta admit, the scary clown isn't so much about how dumb the whit guy is, but how freakishly scary clowns are. It shows how odd it is to have that kind of creature entertaining children to begin with. And he's not stupid, he just stepped on a sharp toy. If that makes you stupid, then we ALL are (that have children).

His wife is calm, yes, but that's because she saw the toy and knows what is up, unlike the kids.

See? It's and anti-clown commercial. Which I totally support.

As a black woman, I think you may be overstating the case.

I'll give you the idiot execs on the two commercials, but then I will point out that where there are kids, the kids giving the info are also white males.

The clown, I'm not so sure I would have thought "idiot" as opposed to "ow". I've stepped on stuff and I suspect my mirror neurons were firing a bit too much to be passing judgment.

And your four commercials didn't exactly make the 92385092385 other ones go away, now did they? If you are so sensitive that you can't have any commercials showing imperfections in other white males (as opposed to say the news commentators continually trying to tie Tiger Woods or the Oracle exec's behaviour to predictions about Obama and therefore all black men), maybe you need to re-evaluate your emotional state.

Wow, I should never read American crap on race. Your nation is severely screwed up.

I am always amazed how little room readers provide to blog writers.

I am a white male and I have noticed the "dumb white male" commercial for a while. I realize that marketing has historically treated minorities much worse. We are not complaining, only noticing and presenting as in...by the way...

I think the point the author was trying to make was that these commercials may not help our society move forward. On the other hand commercials are not meant to help humankind evolve either.

First, Geico is owned by Warren Buffet & Company. That their ads are among the worst these days -- I mean, where are the cavewoman ads? -- illustrates the Frontman Fallacy, which is a common feminist assumption: the mistaken belief that people (old white men, specifically in this case) who are in positions of authority in democratic systems use their power mainly to benefit the categories of people that they belong to themselves. After thousands of years of "male supremacy" my Man Card doesn't even give me the privilege of cutting to the front of the line at the grocery store checkout. Some accomplishment.

The books "Spreading Misandry: The Teaching of Contempt for Men in Popular Culture" and "Legalizing Misandry: From Public Shame to Systemic Discrimination Against Men", by Paul Nathanson & Katherine Young, go into all this to the tune of more that 1000 pages. And they're not the first to call attention to the power of women having 85% of the discretionary spending power in the economy, and what that power goes to create. She who pays the piper...

This misandry has been going on for quite some time, and I don't think it's restricted to just white men, as middle-class suburban black fathers are often a part of the portrayal.

I collected some more examples more than a dozen years ago:

1) A Plymouth spot showed a guy tied up like a dog in the front yard of an upper-middle class suburban house, so he won't chase down the lovely tree-lined streets after minivans (which he desperately wants to do) for his smiling, men-are-soooo-pathetic wife.

2) Continuing the men-are-dogs theme, a cheese industry association ad showed a talking dog leading a man, who is down on the floor on all-fours with a piece of cheese anxiously balanced on his nose, in doing "stupid human tricks".

3) A "Cotton Inc." ad showed a well-meaning but incompetent male fool trying to bake a cake for his family but messing up royally, trashing the entire kitchen in the process. Tylenol Flu had a similar family scenario, with Mom sick in bed and Dad messing up the kitchen trying to keep the family from starving in the interim. Cascade dish-washing soap jumped on this same bandwagon. Both of the former two ads showed dogs anxiously licking their lips in anticipation of the failed results they'd be getting, since what men are capable of cooking is only suitable for consumption by a garbage disposal. Obviously any kitchen is Woman's Domain.

4) Suzuki had an ad for one of their mini-SUV's where a sexy gal in a 4WD gives a come-hither glance to a guy, who, being ruled by his testosterone, stops whatever he's doing to follow her, but then bombs his inferior 4WD out at the bottom of a steep, rocky stretch which she can go up but he can't. He's obviously a loser she can well do without for having bought the wrong vehicle.

5) The next one is a voice-over of a woman who we gather quite quickly is evidently an expert anthropologist presenting a report of a ground-breaking discovery to colleagues at some conference about a "herd of nomadic males" (grunt, grunt). Never mind that men tend to be more solitary, while it's women who travel in the safety of herds. From the woman's voice we gather that she is both young and pretty. Her tone is both smart and confident, the voice of female superiority and authority. Well, she goes on to mention their "crude hunting skills" (how do men manage without women?) and their communication method utilizing the latest in "grunts and groans". Makes the Three Stooges sound like Nobel Prize material.

Because of their primitive nature, the men are very likely violent and dangerous (especially in a group), so the short camera shots are like those in those nature shows of the large predator cats -- they're obviously taken from a very safe distance and from some hidden position well back in the brush. This is an image of woman apart and aloof from beastly men, sneering at them objectively. The female gaze and primitive man. Musn't put the life of a valuable female at the slightest risk, even in the cause of scientific discovery.

6) The next noxious ad didn't run nationally but was courtesy of my local phone company, US Worst (now Qwest). The setting is any evening in some family's rec-room...

Adolescent Girl #1: "It's almost 8:00 and he hasn't called."

Adolescent Girl #2: "He's not going to call."

Adolescent Girl #1: "He said he'd call at 7:30."

Adolescent Girl #2: "He's a boy, remember."

Cut briefly to Dad upstairs at the computer balancing the checkbook and paying the family's mortgage and bills online.

Adolescent Girl #1: "I'll call!"

Adolescent Girl #2: One of those rolling eyes looks while her friend lifts up the receiver on the phone and gets that high-pitched sound of a computer modem online...

Adolescent Girl #1: Realizes what's going on. . .marches (literally) upstairs to where Dad is and declares in protest "You have no idea what you're doing to my social life!".

Dad looks up from the screen and gives that I-haven't-got-a-clue look.

Ok, so here we see two young women building "intimacy" discussing "what's wrong with boys". Girl #2 is obviously the most savvy -- at fourteen she's already on to what jerks guys are, and how they'll never call like they say they will. Then, just as she's going to take the initiative and call him, evidently to give the boy a piece of her mind for being a dolt, she's thwarted by another male, dad.

It's found out the real jerk is Dad, because he's tying up the phone line on the computer paying the bills or something. So even if the particular boy in question really was trying to redeem himself by calling at 7:30 like he said he would, he'll just grow up to be some dorky, dumb guy like Dad.

Nevermind the psychological incest inherent in having your girlfriend right there with you when this anxiously awaited call from The Boy comes. If this highly anticipated phone call expected by Girl #1 was sooooo important, why didn't she communicate this to others in the family so they'd leave the line open at least for a few minutes at 7:30? Or perhaps the girl should find a babysitter job to earn the extra $20 a month to pay for an extra phone line all her own.

7) The all-time winner was this gem from Hefty trash bags:

Domestic goddess #1: "If I had a man like Hefty..."

Domestic goddess #2: "If I had a man like Hefty..."

Domestic goddess #3: "He'd always be coming up with new ways to impress me."

> boiler-plate regarding product

Domestic goddess #3: "And he'd know how to hold on tight."

Domestic goddess #1: (squirming seductively/sensually) "And he wouldn't cave under pressure."

> more boiler-plate, ending with off-camera announcer: "...and it stays put, so it can take it like a man!"

Domestic goddess #:3 "And when I'm done with him.."

> quick flash to Domestic goddess #1 dropping garbage bag carefreely into trash can

Domestic goddess #:3 "Chow, baby!"

Domestic goddess #:2 "Bye, bye!"

Domestic goddess #:1 "So long!"

So there you have it explicitly: MAN = GARBAGE. Dispose of promptly.

And they say men dehumanize women?

I think commercials are bad for society in
many, many ways.

1. The way Mr. Peele pointed out, portraying men as bozos.

2. Priming Effects of Television Food Advertising on Eating Behavior”

http://lucidsystems.com/blog/2009/10/unintended-consequences-food-ads-au...

"Obese and overweight children increase their food
intake by more than 100% after watching food advertisements
on television"

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070424130951.htm

3. They encourage consumerism and shallowness and stress

http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2006/april12/med-tv-041206.html

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/tinted-lenses/200910/post-is-so-mayo

http://www.commercialalert.org/issues/culture/psychology/tv-ads-stress-c...

It used to be that if you wanted to watch TV,
it was pretty much impossible to avoid commercials.

Luckily not any more. Now, all you have to do
is turnoff "free" broadcast TV, and dump cable TV
(where you pay big bucks for the priveledge
of being able to watch huge amounts of commercials.

Instead you can get your TV shows and movies
commercial-free through netflicks or Blockbuster
for much less than cable. Or at least get your
shows online from various website with much
few commercials than on TV for free or much
cheaper than cable.

Of if you want to go really radical, you can
just give up TV altogether.

As for news, there is the old fashioned way
of reading newspapers, and there is the
new-fangled way of getting news through
the intertubes.

Just think, with a little bit of effort
you can free yourselves from the mind-numbing
effect of TV commercials forever!

The pendulum always seems to swing too far in the opposite direction. Is it that societal change requires so much momentum that overcorrection is inevitable?
Resentments for past misgivings are like aftershocks living on in our collective consciousness. Long after laws have changed, wars are over, slaves are freed, women can vote, etc., etc., we still feel the effects of all of it. I can only wonder what's going to happen when gays stop being discriminated against in this country. (I say "when" not "if" because I'm an incurable optimist). Whenever any group is mistreated (real or perceived) by those in power, all of us eventually suffer for it.
I didn't understand the agenda of those commercials if their target audience was men. Maybe to make the viewer feel good by comparison that he isn't married to as big of a b*tch? Or maybe to identify with him and thus the product because he is? Either way it doesn't send positive messages to the way we should regard each other, but I've never really found the advertisement industry to concern themselves with character-building because we wouldn't need to buy their stuff if we were content with ourselves.

Yes, it seems to be open season on white men everywhere, even white men who once stood up for women and other race people.

I particularly dislike who acceptable is for female comediennes to ridicule men. A man doing the same thing would be booed off. It's just all just fun hey...

This has been something I've noticed for quite some time. It has now become almost impossible to find a commercial or a tv show for that matter that portrays a white male as anything but a foil or an idiot.
I suggest the application of this simple test--imagine the same commercial but put a woman or a black man in the white man's role. Would they get away with it? Almost always the answer would be no. If that is the case-- then ask yourself why they can get away with it if they use a white male.
The negative effects throughout the society are evident to anyone who has been paying attention long enough.

"1) A Plymouth spot showed a guy tied up like a dog in the front yard of an upper-middle class suburban house, so he won't chase down the lovely tree-lined streets after minivans (which he desperately wants to do) for his smiling, men-are-soooo-pathetic wife."

That commercial was years ago but I still think about it every time I see another commercial that bashes men of any color or age. It was an incredible affront and I don't drive a Chrysler or Plymouth to this day because of that type of attitude in that commercial.

Being a white male who attended one of the nation's service academies, I was always bemused by the women who came in demanding equal treatment then cried and asked the men to carry their packs and rifles when they became too heavy to carry on their own. I didn't treat those women so nicely. I never held the door for them going to classes, I never went out of my way to treat them any differently at all. But they still had different physical standards from the men when it came to the PT tests. What a joke. I give respect where it is earned. That experience made me more of a misogynist than if women were simply left out of the service academies or kept separate. The genders are different. Get over it. And to punish the current generation of men just because men in the past lorded it over you, is as unfair and asinine as the mistreatment minorities receive today.

We need to get past these labels and approach each other as human beings and be judged as Martin Luther King said, "not by the color of their skin (or gender), but by the content of their character." We should add gender to this quote now.