Kiss of Death

If you'll dig a little deeper into this (it's making all the rounds on certain blogs), the commercial which aired during the Super Bowl is just the tip of the iceberg.

While there were some folks who were offended by the Super Bowl ad itself, it was actually the website which was tied into it that really set off the firestorm.

Specifically, the website included footage of football players watching the commercial and getting all grossed out by it. Not exactly a message of tolerance to be putting out from would-be role models.

But what crossed the line (for me at least), was the additional commercials in this same series, which were apparently on the site and scheduled to be aired on TV (during the Daytona 500, I've read) as follow-ons to this one.

In one, the "manly" solution to the "kiss" was to drink antifreeze and of course double over in agony. In another, it was for one guy to attack the other with a large wrench.

So, if you accidently kiss another dude, this is such a violation of manhood that either poisoning yourself or beating the hell out of the other guy is the only way to counteract it.

I agree that some folks can be a bit too sensitive about the portrayal of gay behavior on TV. But in this case, it was a concerted multimedia effort to build upon the theme of "doing gay stuff is really bad" that generated the real outrage over the commercial. Again, at least from my perspective.

Props by the way for the "locking lips as you each took a long, thick, sweet rod of candy into your mouths" note in your review of the commercial. On its own merits, and with observations like that, the whole thing could've been considered fairly harmless fun.

Eeeewwww!!!! I thought was ad was crass and tastless! My husband covered his eyes! I hadn't even considered that gay people would be offended by it, but I guess they would be.

Nasty.

Landy,

I hear you about the offensiveness of the web material. It was my impression, though, that reaction to the TV spot itself was what motivated Masterfoods. I can't be sure of that, of course.

Incidentally, in the Super Bowl spot, the guys "do something manly" by ripping handfuls of hair off their chests. Is removing the hair from your chest really the hallmark of straight-maleness today? Metrosexuality really has gone mainstream, I guess.

The ad itself isn't the problem. The men's effort at "manliness" was so obviously ridiculous as to render them parodies, and therefore implicitly to ridicule their homophobic reaction.

The reaction of the NFL players, however, is entirely different. It's hardly surprising that players feel this way; what's hard to understand is why Masterfoods felt it appropriate -- even funny, I guess -- to broadcast these images of intolerance, and to leave them available even today.

Imagine that the candy bar were enjoyed by a bi-racial couple and that a similar reaction ensued. Would Masterfoods have posted that, or even sought the reactions of the players in the first place? Or even created the ad, for that matter?

Snickers would truly be a kiss of death for me as I, like millions of others, am allergic to peanuts!

I wish I knew how to quit you Snickers..

Totally ridicoulous, the add was disguisting but funny and I can't believe homosexuals have to bitch about everything when it's not their way.

Sincerely, Heterosexual

You know I am a gay man and I personally thought that the commercail was hilarious. NO, I am not homophobic against myself. It is just that I saw it for what it was- a commercial. It was just a humourous ad to sell snickers. Besides, even if it was a homophobic ad, you are giving them the power and satisfaction of you being offended by it, and therefore they win, because they did what they wanted to do. I DON'T think that that was the case, and for that I am NOT offended by it because I am under the assumption that it was JUST A COMMERCIAL. there is a reason that Homosexuals are seen as picky and hard to please, it's because many complain when there is not a problem. just watch the commercial, the men did something that was not expected, they are not gay, so they were surprised, and made fools of themselves, and then you saw the ad. As for the other commercials on the site, again, I don't feel that there is a homophobic remark being made, it just more and more ridiculous parody. so stop worrying yourselves...when something is offensive, don't worry, because that's like someone calling you something and you getting offended by it every single time. Don't you think it's time to just say, "Yeah, well, ok...whatever" then it won't have any power, and we can all just get on with our lives instead of having these stupid little political battles over absolutly nothing.

One would think that out of all the people involved in an ad campaign, and all the time that went into it, somewhere along the line someone would be smart enough to spend just a couple seconds wondering who might be offended. However you have to over think everything these days to make sure you don't offend someone. Heck, I thought PETA would be all over the Blockbuster ad where the rabbit was abusing the mouse. It's just an ad. Get over it.

Speaking as one gay man, I thought the ad was hilarious. The idea that two men, in love with a candy bar, touch lips, and then pull chest hairs as punishment - a riot. If anyone should be offended, I'd think it would be heterosexual men for being portrayed as that shallow that they would go that far. It was "homophobia", not homosexuality, that was the brunt of this great joke.

The Ad is actually PROMOTING homosexuality...in a byzantine manner. I, for one, will never eat another snickers bar.

I THINK IT WAS A HALARIOUS COMERCIAL AND IT GETS FUNIER EVRYTIME I SEE IT.....JUST BECUASE IT MIGHT BE A GAY COMERCIAL IT DOESNT MEAN THAT IT SHOULD EFFECT US THAT BADLY....I LAUGHED SOO HARD WHEN I SAW IT AND IT SHOULD SATY ON TV AND THE WEB!!!

Regarding the football players reactions: Being grossed out by two men thouching lips is not intolerant, it's simply how many straight men would react. The idea of kissing another man is undesriable and "gross" to them. It doesn't necessarily mean that they hate gays. This is being blown way out of proportion.

It was just a commercial that all it was, its amazing for me to think that homosexuals would stop complaining about everything then maybe they would be accepted a lot quicker.

A great commercial. I'm hetro, but not homophobic, and I found the ad to be the funniest of the night. I don't see what the big deal is......It's just a commercial people...get over it!!!

Thank you for getting that filth off the air. My six-year-old son recently asked me if it's ok to hit homosexual people with large wrenches and submit himself to bodily harm after he accidentally kisses is friends... Good thing he was in the potty when the snickers add aired. Instead, he just walks around slapping me in the face when I try to give him a fist pound... I mean, what has this world come to when parents like myself have to wonder if the T.V. is raising our children properly.

Football players getting grossed out by this commercial? Am I the only one who noticed the irony rampant in the fact that this is a group of men who routinely pat each other on the ass?

I had the same reaction about the "manly-ness" of the guys ripping off their chest hair. It's just another example of how, by itself, the commercial inevitably would've ticked off some of the more sensitive and/or ever-vigilant P.C. folks, but otherwise could've been absorbed as fairly harmless fun by most. My blog reading skews liberal, and the majority opinion ranged from thinking it was laugh out loud funny to "didn't seem all that bad".

But when the commercial is backed by an elaborate, well-funded, NFL (and presumably NASCAR) sanctioned follow-on campaign where the MAIN POINT is to hammer home the fact that two guys' lips merely touching is SO flagrantly repulsive .... building up to a finale where assault with a deadly weapon is the 'manly' response .... it goes beyond being Geico Caveman disrespect, or even (as one site put it) Will Farrell type buffoonery, and into dangerous territory. It's all harmless frat boy humor, until someone gets hurt or worse.

Again, the commercial itself .... the one shown during the Super Bowl .... not such a big deal. It being the tip of a larger iceberg -- that's the issue for those having more than the typical knee-jerk reactions.

It was just a commercial. And like mentioned before it really makes fun of homophobes more than anything else. However the only homophobes I hear complaining about this commercial are the ones who don't like to see men kissing each other (however I'm sure if it was two women making out with each other they would be drooling all over themselves). The football players did not even come out and say that the commercial was gross, and even then that is personal preference. Not everyone likes to watch people make out with each other, and some people don't like to watch people of the same sex make out with each other. If you recall it takes place in an auto shop and two greasy unattractive mechanics sandwhich a candy bar inbetweeen their faces. It was was gross. I am sure no one watched that commercial and got turned on by it.
If one of my friends says that he is not attrached to women of color does that make him a racist? Not in my opinion. It doesn't mean he hates people of color it just means that he is not attrached to them in a romantic sense. You can not help what you are or what you are not attrached to. People with alternative lifestyles I would hope understand that.

Get a life people, there are way more important things to worry about, than a damn commercial, jeez

I saw the commercial in a room full of both straight and gay men and women. I think everyone in the room winced. Personally, I was more appalled by the fact that these two men were munching down on what looked like a big brown log when they locked lips than I was that it was two men. If it had been a man and a woman, I still would have winced. And speaking as a straight woman, tasting a man's lips would come as a little bit of an eye opener after having made sweet mouth love to a delicious candy bar.

Those who think that the ads parody homophobic men have no clue about how people relate to the media. People tend to identify with what they already believe, so homophobes' beliefs are reenforced, not challenged. This explains why slurs against gays and lesbians have increased and why KKK membership has increased in the past year. The mockery of Brokeback Mountain and anti-gay slurs by celebrities in the past year as well as attacks on immigrants by people like CNN's Lou Dobbs have opened the gates of bigotry and have made it less shameful. Let's not forget the racist slurs as well. Stay tuned, it's only going to get worse.

Get over it! It's only a commercial. There are bigger issues out there to worry about than 2 men "kissing" on TV. Would it have caused this much of a stir if it was 2 attractive women rather than 2 men?

I think the commercial has done its job. Created a huge stir. Hmnn I wouldnt mind having some Snickers now. Sales and revenues are going to go high!!

stop the insanity, lets leave gay ppl alone, they mean no harm, btw the whole snickers ad campaign on male kissing and the subsequent actions definitely sucks, didn't they have a brain when they conceived the campaign, i mean c'mon, madison ave's getting paid a lot more than us mortals to come up wit this.

sincerely,
heterosexual