Politics
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August 6, 2025
At first, the proper needed to assert progressives had been delusional for seeing a slide again into white supremacy within the American Eagle advert. Now they’re boasting about it.
Advert Coverage
An commercial that includes actress Sydney Sweeney exterior an American Eagle retailer in New York, US, on Aug. 4,. American Eagle Outfitters Inc. shares surged after US President Donald Trump got here out in assist of a controversial advert from the corporate that includes actress Sydney Sweeney.
(Photographer: Michael Nagle / Bloomberg)
The very first thing you discover in actor Sydney Sweeney’s controversial advert marketing campaign for American Eagle blue denims most likely received’t be her denims, however her cleavage as she reclines shirtless beneath a decent jean jacket. The tagline is, “Sydney Sweeney has nice denims.” I point out this to not boob-shame however to say, this advert is working on so many ranges, from sexuality to race to politics, it shouldn’t be stunning that it’s turn into the newest tradition conflict battleground. Nicely performed, American Eagle.
Lest you suppose in any other case, Sweeney’s cleavage isn’t what’s made the advert marketing campaign controversial. It’s the play on denims/genes. There’s {a magazine} photograph, which prominently options her breasts, in addition to a video advert, during which the actor intones, sounding type of bored: “Genes are handed down from mother and father to offspring, usually figuring out traits like hair coloration, persona, and even eye coloration.” The digital camera pans to her blue eyes, and he or she says: “My denims are blue.”
Progressives pouncedprovoked by the obvious introduction of genetics into clothes advertisements. A TikTok influencer known as it “actually…Nazi propaganda.” That could be an overstatement, however there’s something sketchy about an advert that references “genes” whereas that includes the white supremacist very best of womanhood—blonde, blue-eyed and busty. An MSNBC columnist known as it proof of “an unbridled cultural shift towards whiteness.”
Maybe surprisingly, many on the proper agree. Whereas at first some mocked progressive outrage as “hysteria,” now they’re proud to embrace the advert marketing campaign’s celebration of whiteness, throwing off the yoke of woke. Proper-wingers Megyn Kelly and Fox’s Laura Ingraham are declaring the advert a part of a protracted overdue backlash towards definitions of magnificence that don’t heart whiteness. On social media, on her podcast, and on her personal website, Kelly is giddy concerning the Sweeney advert:
We have now been struggling with the elevation of homely folks in our vogue advertisements and our health advertisements for years now, and we’re over it. We miss engaging folks. We’re sick of attempting to fake that these objectively unattractive individuals are the brand new magnificence commonplace. They don’t seem to be.
However right here is the piece nobody is saying that I believe must be mentioned as a result of it’s actual and there’s nothing improper with it: We’re sick and bored with the nonsense the place you aren’t allowed to ever rejoice somebody who’s white, blonde, and blue eyed; that we now have to stroll right into a room apologetic for these issues. In a means, this advert is the ultimate declaration that we’re accomplished doing that sh-t.
Kelly is likely to be finest identified for insisting that Santa Claus, a fictional character, is undeniably white, pushing again on the proliferation of Black Santas in malls and within the media.
Fox’s Laura Ingraham has targeted two segments on the Sweeney advert. On X, she circulated a visitor’s remark, echoing Kelly: “They don’t really consider that is the resurrection of the Third Reich. They hate what Sydney Sweeney represents: the autumn of wokeness, fats satisfaction, gender androgyny, and DEI. They did not reprogram the inhabitants into pondering ugly is gorgeous.”
Bari Weiss’s Free Presswhich focuses on making woke backlash tales appear affordable, additionally pushed the Kelly/Ingraham line.
These days the American public has grown used to a really completely different type of advert, which tried to persuade us magnificence is no matter they are saying it’s this week. You already know those: the sagging swimsuit campaigns, the big-and-proud lingerie shoots, the breathless press releases declaring that illustration is the brand new hotness. For roughly a decade, manufacturers insisted on telling us what we should always discover attractive—stretch marks, again rolls, seen panic issues—whether or not we appreciated it or not.
The physique positivity motion informed us, loudly and continually, that everybody is gorgeous, that each one our bodies are worthy of the highlight, {that a} triple chin was not solely regular, however empowering. Weight problems wasn’t a well being disaster, it was an identification. That period wasn’t actually about celebrating ladies. It was about neutralizing magnificence. Sanding down the sharp edges of desirability till nobody felt disregarded, and nobody stood out.
…Whether or not she meant to be or not, (Sweeney is) a type of a strolling center finger to the motion that attempted to explode all of our old style concepts about magnificence.
Sinking within the polls, even Donald Trump acquired into the motion, posting on Fact Social: “Sydney Sweeney, a registered Republican, has the ‘HOTTEST’ advert on the market. It’s for American Eagle, and the denims are ‘flying off the cabinets.’ Go get ‘em Sydney!” He contrasted her along with his Democratic nemesis Taylor Swift, who he insisted is “NO LONGER HOT.” You’d suppose, given the continuing information about his ties to the late youngster intercourse trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, he is likely to be extra cautious about weighing in on the “hotness” of younger ladies, however you’d be improper.
After all, folks of a sure age might be reminded of the uproar over mannequin and actor Brooke Shields’s 1980 Calvin Klein denims advertthat includes the tagline “You need to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing,” a not too delicate suggestion that the 15-year-old was not carrying panties. On condition that Shields had starred as a baby prostitute within the movie “Fairly Child” at age 11, the advert outraged folks involved concerning the sexualization of younger ladies—and little question delighted Epstein and Trump.
However now race and genetics have been added to the combination. Trump is famously a proponent of the “good genes” clarification of racism and inequality. In the meantime, Megyn Kelly can’t assist herself: She slammed Beyoncé’s advert marketing campaign for Levi’s on X at present: “That is the alternative of the Sydney Sweeney advert. Fairly clearly there’s nothing pure about Beyonce. All the things – from her picture to her fame to her success to her look under – is purchased and paid for. Screams synthetic, faux, enhanced, attempting too arduous.”
Megyn, your publish screams “racism.”
At first, the proper needed to assert progressives had been delusional for seeing a slide again into white supremacy within the Sweeney advert marketing campaign. Now they’re boasting about it. They’re solely convincing me that among the advert’s critics are proper.
Joan Walsh
Joan Walsh, a nationwide affairs correspondent for The Nation, is a coproducer of The Sit-In: Harry Belafonte Hosts The Tonight Present and the creator of What’s the Matter With White Folks? Discovering Our Method within the Subsequent America. Her new e book (with Nick Hanauer and Donald Cohen) is Company Bullsh*t: Exposing the Lies and Half-Truths That Defend Revenue, Energy and Wealth In America.
