Critics savagely attacked Sydney Sweeney’s advertisement for American Eagle, but they’re entirely missing the mark on this one. The ad is perfect — society needs help.
The ad, launched July 23 under the tagline “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans,” has caused an uproar on social media. The apparent play on words for Sweeney’s ‘great genes’ didn’t land well for all audiences. Some internet users suggested the campaign carries disturbing undertones of white supremacy and aired their complaints about the ad glorifying a particular aesthetic ideal. Haters lashed out over the focus being put on a white, blonde, blue-eyed woman in what they viewed as an oversexualized ad.
It seems they missed the memo here. American Eagle is selling sexy jeans. They hired a sexy woman — like so many other ad campaigns have done before them. The art of clever marketing seems to be lost on this whiny generation.
In one clip, Sweeney says “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring … My ‘jeans’ are blue,” as the camera lingers on her blue eyes and blonde hair, then pans her cleavage.
The advertisement was perfectly cast and created, and the overly sensitive viewers who are reading too much into this need to do their homework.
TOPSHOT – US actress Sydney Sweeney attends the Vanity Fair Oscars Party at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, California, on March 10, 2024. (Photo by Michael TRAN / AFP) (Photo by MICHAEL TRAN/AFP via Getty Images)
For decades, marketing jeans — and almost everything else — has walked hand-in-hand with sexualized imagery, an age-old strategy that sells denim by selling desire. Rewind back to 1980 when 15-year-old Brooke Shields starred in the now-infamous Calvin Klein ad. She stared into the camera and provocatively asked, “You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing.”
The iconic ad sparked national controversy — and catapulted her career.
Cindy Crawford’s iconic Pepsi commercial dating back to 1992 featured the supermodel oozing sex appeal by sipping Pepsi in cutoffs jeans. She was framed as the all-American beauty — effortlessly sexy, casual and unattainable. (RELATED: Sydney Sweeney To Start Selling Soap With Her Own Bathwater Mixed In)
Today’s backlash against Sydney Sweeney’s “great jeans” ad suggests it struck different political nerves, but the ad itself is rooted in the same tradition: using beauty, suggestion and controversy to make denim unforgettable. The idea is to sell jeans — and an attractive model does precisely that.
