I have never been this upset about sandwiches before, and that’s saying a lot. Everything about this Subway ad is personally offensive to me. Everything. It is a sexist perfect storm, insulting enough in its mere 30 second running time to make me want to revenge-eat my feelings at the nearest Quiznos. Here’s Subway’s description for their new ad’s premise:
Bikini season may be over, but there’s more reasons right around the corner to stay fit with delicious, low-fat sandwiches from SUBWAY®.
Ah, yes! Bikini season! That dreaded time of year in which women must diet or exercise to fit a specific, arbitrary and often unattainable mold, aka level up to achieve the elusive “bikini body.” What the advertisers that profit off this deliberately unrealistic beauty standard neglect to mention, however, is that getting a bikini body is actually very easy and requires spending a sum total of zero dollars at Subway or anywhere else that calls avocado “addvocado”.
HOW TO GET A BIKINI BODY: GET A BIKINI. PUT YOUR BODY IN IT.
There’s an amazing cartoon saying pretty much that floating around the Internet right now; if any of you have it feel free to leave in the comments below.
The whole idea that women must eat healthily and exercise in the summer, so they can then can “be bad” or “cheat” a little during the colder months is damaging both physically and emotionally, partially because “healthy” is almost always conflated with “skinny.” And now, callooh, callay Subway Fucking Sandwiches is here to announce a new, surprise “bikini season” in October? The season of 24/7 pumpkin fever? The season centered almost entirely around candy? You monsters.
On top of tarnishing the most fun holiday of the year with bikini talk, the ad then implies that the only motivation for staying “fit” is to appeal to the male gaze. Yes, Crazy Subway Woman and her bottomless trunk of costumes never explicitly say women need to be skinny to wear a revealing Halloween costume, but considering the ad’s context, insisting otherwise would just be backpedaling. Subway implies that one’s body must fit a very specific mold for others to find it sexy, a mold one can only fit into with Subway’s help.
Anyone who wants to dress as an Attractive Nurse, Spicy Red Riding Hood, Viking Princess Warrior, Hot Devil, Sassy Teacher, or Foxy Fullback this year deserves to do so no matter what their body looks like. If Sexoween is your jam, then more power to you. It’s equally awesome to wear a costume that is scary, funny, or creative. We can be all those things. That’s part of the beauty of this time of year.
Am I reading a lot into a mere 30-second commercial? Absolutely. But people have starved themselves over less. Besides, you don’t fuck with Halloween ’round these here parts. Not for shitty sandwiches, you don’t.
(via Jezebel)
Are you following The Mary Sue on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Pinterest, & Google +?
