PATREON EXCLUSIVE: Sydney's Jeans
Added 2025-07-29 01:22:06 +0000 UTCYou know how sometimes you see a logo for a company and it totally looks like a dick and you think, "How did this happen? How did every single person involved in the creation of this company look at this logo and think, 'yeah that's it. That's totally our logo'. How did nobody see the dick??" There's a world in which that could be what's happening here. It could just be something that they somehow didn't see until it was too late. Or... it could just be exactly what it looks like it is. What do you think?
Comments
Also I think that if you're a goddamn marketing professional you HAVE to have that antenna up to do your job ethically. They have a moral obligation to understand and avoid dogwhistles and not doing so should make you far less employable.
dev.l
2025-09-13 23:07:11 +0000 UTCI mean that's the literal point of dog whistles: plausible deniability.
dev.l
2025-09-13 23:00:51 +0000 UTCI think that at a certain point it doesn't fckn matter anymore and the reading is happening either way. Also they picked a Ford for a reason.
dev.l
2025-09-13 22:57:16 +0000 UTCI think the problem I have with giving the benefit of the doubt is that that's exactly how people get away with saying and doing bad things--and with getting worse and worse. They push that line and then are like "What? We weren't doing anything bad!" when they get called on it. Then when it blows over and nothing bad happens they do it again, but a little worse. And then a little more. It's teaching people to gradually accept the unacceptable.
Heather Kirchhefer
2025-08-03 05:49:12 +0000 UTCI agree I can see both sides. How they respond will really be telling. Either way… the slogan is REALLY bad and uncreative. I feel like that’s something my 9 year old son would have thought of. It should have been tossed the second it was pitched.
Jaime L
2025-07-30 19:58:45 +0000 UTCOn Patreon you get *all the juicy boogers*
Mally_and_the_concrete_duckies
2025-07-30 18:22:39 +0000 UTCWhile I agree it may very well be a fuck up, I stand by the internet continuing to call it the blue jeans eugenics ad. We've all seen the Folger's incest commercial. Just because it was a fuck up doesn't mean that we shouldn't keep it in mind and have it as a reminder for those who write future ad campaigns. Tbh, this kerfuffle can be easily solved by expanding the campaign to include attractive POCs. Doesn't even have to remain female focused.
Mally_and_the_concrete_duckies
2025-07-30 18:16:32 +0000 UTCI also think we need to conserve political capital. We can’t attack every thing that may be happening. Attack the things that are unquestionably wrong (there are plenty of them). Focus on that and skip the stuff that will just cause people to tune us out
Jeff
2025-07-30 17:11:11 +0000 UTCI am “team fuckup” I think of this quote: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor?wprov=sfti1
Jeff
2025-07-30 17:07:52 +0000 UTCEven given the best excuse that can be applied here..... for me its about how they respond to the concern. Humans are allowed to make mistakes. How do you respond to criticism of being wrong in something? If its in good faith people say holy shit im so sorry and follow up with appropriate action. If its subversive in it messaging well then not trying to repair or fix it is the message itself to me. It is easy to mess up and accidently hurt people. How do you handle the correction?
Aubrey Schwarz
2025-07-30 12:23:48 +0000 UTCIt’s a good exercise in spotting subtle messaging and discerning its intent. At the very least, it’s worth a side eye and putting AE on notice.
Jessica H
2025-07-30 05:43:29 +0000 UTCI thought that to American Eagle it was a cute play on words, but your point about them picking Sweeney instead of Kravitz made me wonder. 😒 I don't know if Sweeney is smart enough to get it though
Yvonne Fruth
2025-07-29 22:35:49 +0000 UTCI’m sure you are right about that. I want to believe it was just a dumb joke, but it’s just impossible these days.
Johnny 5
2025-07-29 20:28:14 +0000 UTChttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbW1lfjDVfo
Johnny 5
2025-07-29 20:20:44 +0000 UTCIf we lived in a very different political climate it could easily just be a dumb double entendre. That said, the fact she is a poster girl for MAGA. And overt racist behavior is being normalized. The Nazi salute keeps showing up. I think it's a dog whistle.
Laura Plybon
2025-07-29 20:00:36 +0000 UTCGotta say im happy i joined up on the patreon side. Im enjoying hearing your perspective on these kinds of things that you might not feel comfortable posting on your larger platforms. I agree with you. I think (especially in the current political climate) that it was distasteful and has the potential to be dangerous (in a slippery slope, people trying to see what they can get away with /propaganda pushing type way) But we have no way of truly knowing the intention behind it.
Kasey stubbles
2025-07-29 19:38:02 +0000 UTCAt the very least, there was no one in the room at any stage of this campaign who picked up on this and was important enough to be listened to, which is indicative of a problem at American Eagle. I think people should feel valid in boycotting the brand over this, for this reason alone.
Tiffany Howard
2025-07-29 17:52:47 +0000 UTCI completely understand what you're saying. However, I think it's dangerous to see these kinds of things as just tragic accidents. As this woman says, things like this help shift the acceptability. If we shrug our shoulders & excuse it, we're actually helping them move the Overton window further to the right. I think that's why so many ppl are calling attention to it & calling it out. Bc even if it was 20 layers of deep stupidity masked by marketing bro humor attempts, white supremacy & the Christian nationalists still benefit from it. It still contributes to their narratives & helps to pull gullible ppl who haven't deconstructed into their folds. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8khYU36/
Lucertola
2025-07-29 16:04:09 +0000 UTCMaybe….but the background of the CEO and is wife is not good!!! And as you said her family is MAGA so I see a bit of supporting evidence 😑 also if they do a series of ads with brown people now they might get this under control
Sacred Vandalism
2025-07-29 15:04:09 +0000 UTCI don’t think it’s pro eugenics, it’s just avoiding the anti woke crowd by picking the safest color. The risk of the progressive misunderstanding is way lower than maga backlash. Edit: To put a point on it, when you piss off the left, your sales go down 2-3% a la Target. When you piss off the right, the dictator tweets about you and you have to pay bribes to him to stay in business. Then you are forever marked as next on the list for the camps or vigilante cultists.
Chairdevil
2025-07-29 10:28:08 +0000 UTCI hear what you're putting down and it seems very possible... But when you add in her MAGA ties it seems more apparent that it was intentional... Let's p**s off the Libs while maintaining just enough credible deniability... I wasn't buying those jeans anyway...
Dale Allen Platt
2025-07-29 10:05:42 +0000 UTCYeah, I get it. But you're wearing a Chicago Bulls shirt. So you're definitely MS-13... right? Austin Archer... Hardcore Gangster! 😂😂
Andrew Bradwin
2025-07-29 09:40:15 +0000 UTCI had that same thought. Things were different... more "loosey-goosey" with what was acceptable in the 80s, especially when it came to sexualizing a minor, like Brooke Shields was at the time
LeftyBlue
2025-07-29 04:45:19 +0000 UTCShe's not even a natural blonde lol But that's the "starlet" look, as you say
Delphia
2025-07-29 04:10:32 +0000 UTCMarketing and creative teams spend hours on the meaning & what it can or might look like. Optics is huge in branding and AE was selling controversy, the hot topic , and most likely their overall values as a company. Poor choice. They still got the attention they wanted. Zoe would have been an excellent choice. She resonates with everyone. Not just white audience. Pepsi commercial with Cindy Crawford was a great comparison-sexy, funny, a hook-all the things but doing a reboot of Broke Shields at 14-not good. Not sure what AE’s team had in mind & that’s what makes it worse. None of us all feel collectively like Yeah-let’s go by AE jeans-it’s not a good ad period.
Des
2025-07-29 03:47:12 +0000 UTCAgreed. Whether it was intentional or not kind of doesn’t matter. It looks how it looks and it should be fixed.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:55:51 +0000 UTCOkay, so, I get the possibility that it was a mistake (not convinced, but the possibility, sure). But I don't think that's where the conversation should stop. Because regardless of whether it was intentional, this is the type of ad that will embolden people who believe in eugenics. Even if it was a mistake, people (and yes even marketing teams!) have a responsibility to focus on impact over intention. If it was an honest mistake, make it right. You have 2 options. Run the same ad campaign with a woman of color on the billboards, or pull the ad.
Brandi MV McCoy
2025-07-29 02:54:55 +0000 UTCVery interesting context.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:45:44 +0000 UTCIt is wild for sure.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:45:01 +0000 UTCDefinitely.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:44:42 +0000 UTCAgreed. Whether you make the logo of your company look like a clown assaulting a child on purpose or on accident is kind of irrelevant. It looks like what it looks like, and it should be fixed.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:43:49 +0000 UTCOh you’re not wrong. It’s definitely there for those with eyes to see.
Austin Archer
2025-07-29 02:42:47 +0000 UTCI see what you’re saying, but I also think that because they picked HER it’s a dog whistle. They could have picked a Zoe Kravitz, as you said, or anyone else conventionally attractive with a “good” bloodline. But because they picked Sydney and because she literally talks about her blonde hair and blue eyes in the ad… boy, it just seems intentional. And she’s selling jeans, right? So trying to come at it like she has great tits but she’s selling jeans… idk, you’d think they’d pick someone with a god-given juicy ass, no?
Elise Tanner
2025-07-29 02:30:26 +0000 UTCIt's undeniably problematic whether it was intentional or not 😬
Scott Phillips
2025-07-29 02:28:01 +0000 UTCI watched the video and read articles. I lived in NYC in the 70's when I was in HS. All the clothing ads in times square had "beautiful" people. I believed then that it was wrong. The idea of what was beautiful was distorted, and still is. Have we learned nothing?
Kellie Bishop Porter
2025-07-29 02:26:12 +0000 UTCYeah.....not a great time for it for sure. I could see what you mean, I think its definitely a stupid (emphasis on stupid) guy humor ad, but people need to dig a little deeper when pumping out media that is heavily pushed on the world right now. If anything, it just shows how little diversity their team has. This definitely should've been caught at some point in the process of coming up with this ad.
Ciro DaCosta
2025-07-29 02:00:41 +0000 UTCI can’t help but think of Brooke Shields and her Calvin Klein “Nothing comes between me and my Calvins” commercial when she was just 15. Maybe way different, but it was super controversial at the time.
Vicki McGuire
2025-07-29 01:55:48 +0000 UTCI never understand how it doesn’t get noticed by the PR team. Baffles me.
Andrew David Wright
2025-07-29 01:53:05 +0000 UTCI think I need to know more about being a jeans expert. 😎 Also, now I need to look up what your talking about. 😆
Kellie Bishop Porter
2025-07-29 01:50:26 +0000 UTCSpot on takes as always. Thanks for taking the time away from your holiday in heaven to record this lmao
DiamondClovr
2025-07-29 01:46:32 +0000 UTCFrom what I’ve seen, the CEO is invested in Israel. I feel like to someone who seems to be so connected to the Jewish religion, this would be something that sounds scarily familiar.
Hannahkin Skywalker
2025-07-29 01:33:53 +0000 UTCHomophones sound the same. Spelled different. Jeans and genes are homophones. Bow (rhymes with cow) & bow(rhymes with toe) are homonyms. Homo(same) + Phon(sound). Homo(same) + Nym(name) That being said, I haven't seen the ad so I can't say for sure which side the ball lands on with this. I mean I guess it's possible it's just a play on the word jeans and maybe people are reading into it too much. I will hold judgement until I see it
LeftyBlue
2025-07-29 01:31:55 +0000 UTC
