# Do gays really just hurt themselves with "blatant" advertising? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 19, 2012, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660 "2012-06-19T17:24:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Mnemnosyne](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mnemnosyne/32/3347_2.png) [@Mnemnosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mnemnosyne)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/81 "2012-06-20T02:28:06Z")
I think things like that video are precisely appropriate. Normal gay people doing normal things. Anyone who thinks scenes like this should be covered up or hidden may not be actively homophobic, but they aren’t quite getting the point. When a male and female couple do something like that it’s seen as normal, sweet, heartwarming. The very idea that a gay couple should _not_ be shown in that light is inherently telling them to hide their relationship. Straight people often say they’re fine with gay people as long as it’s not ‘shoved in their faces’ but they fail to comprehend that they are considering normal everyday public behavior as something being ‘shoved in their faces’. No one bats an eye when a man and woman hug, give each other a quick kiss, a woman talks about her husband or a man about his wife. But when a gay couple do those exact same things, many people immediately perceive this as inappropriate exhibition. It’s not, and any attempt to consider it such sets a terrible double-standard. I would say that this is exactly the sort of image we need to see _more_ of, so that people view it as normal. Yes, there will be some backlash by bigots who can use such messages as an excuse, but overall I think it will be a strong forward step when such sights are common enough that it’s no longer possible to point to a single instance and comment on it as an unusual thing. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/82 "2012-06-20T02:29:33Z")
> [@mister\_nyx](#): > > You spoke out against a commercial whose content should be completely unremarkable, attempted to couch what you said in faux concern for gay rights, and talked down to gay people by explaining how straight people react to us, as though we aren’t all much more familiar with that topic than you are. > So the standard you set for yourself is not being “brutally oppressive”, then. > > I set a higher standard than that for myself. Since you’re congratulating yourself on meeting that low standard, I don’t think we’re going to reach a meeting of minds on this point. > [@](#): > > You spoke out against a commercial whose content should be completely unremarkable, And yet oddly, for many people, possibly even a majority of the viewing audience it would not be “completely unremarkable”, it would be quite remarkable. Your position that a comment reflecting this fairly obvious reality is by default “condescending” and “talking down” to gay people is quite interesting. The OP was asking > [@](#): > > So what do people think? Is such advocacy advertising harmful or helpful? Are gays just creating a backlash that “society at large” should not be surprised at? Apparently any opinion re the potential real world advertising impact of that commercial other than a strongly pro-PDA position is going to be wholly unacceptable to you. I 'm sorry my opinion re the OP’s question of how that commercial might come across to to a heterosexual demographic was unacceptable to you. I really am. ---
**Author:** ![mister\_nyx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@mister\_nyx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_nyx)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/83 "2012-06-20T02:38:17Z")
> [@astro](#): > > And yet oddly, for many people, possibly even a majority of the viewing audience it would not be “completely unremarkable”, it would be quite remarkable. Your position that a comment reflecting this fairly obvious reality is by default “condescending” and “talking down” to gay people is quite interesting. I said that it _should be_ completely unremarkable. The fact that you can’t understand the difference between “should be” and “is” reinforces my feeling that you obviously have no business lecturing gay people about what we already know so very, very well. > [@](#): > > Apparently any opinion re the potential real world advertising impact of that commercial other than a strongly pro-PDA position is going to be wholly unacceptable to you. When it consists of a bunch of concern-trolling mixed with claims to be totally in favor of gay rights but grossed out by seeing a tame kiss in a TV commercial, yeah, it is unacceptable. Why in the world would I find that acceptable? Fortunately, you were the only straight person who felt the need to share that opinion (aside from Valteron’s friend). > [@](#): > > I 'm sorry my opinion re the OP’s question of how that commercial might come across to to a heterosexual demographic was unacceptable to you. I really am. If you really are, I hope it means you’ll stop and reconsider the implications of ominous warnings that straight people might be offended (again, as though any gay person anywhere is unaware of that!) If indeed I was wrong and you weren’t just concern trolling, I’m sure you’ll be glad to hear and respond to the perspective of someone who knows the issue a lot better than you do. Because any gay person has way more perspective on how straight people respond to us than a straight person who only has their own perspective to draw on. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/84 "2012-06-20T03:00:37Z")
> [@florez](#): > > If that really is the reason for the ire over seeing women wear traditional head coverings, then it is stereotyping a group of people, in that many Muslim women do so by choice. It is also arrogant and ignorant to assume to know the reason a woman wears a burka or hijab, just as it is arrogant and ignorant to assume that all gay men are effeminate. To presume women that wear them always have a choice is equally arrogant and ignorant. [QUOTE=Ibn Warraq] If those same people shit their pants every time they saw Amish women or Hasidic Jewish women in their traditional wear you’d have a point, but with rare exceptions they don’t. [/quote] Do those traditional clothes involve completely covering the persons face? Islamic dress borrowed it’s tradition from Orthodox Christians and I contend if they still did so the outrage would be equal and exhibit A that this isn’t an Islamophobic tirade. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/85 "2012-06-20T03:03:00Z")
> [@mister\_nyx](#): > > You spoke out against a commercial whose content should be completely unremarkable, attempted to couch what you said in faux concern for gay rights, and talked down to gay people by explaining how straight people react to us, as though we aren’t all much more familiar with that topic than you are. In fairness, while you’re undoubtedly more familiar with how straight people _openly_ react to you, he is presumably more familiar with how straight people react to you in other ways. Anyway, he wasn’t “grossed out”. He specifically noted that he wasn’t “squicked”, which I presume is roughly equivalent. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/86 "2012-06-20T03:16:56Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > Do those traditional clothes involve completely covering the persons face? Nor does the Chador or the Hijab. However that didn’t stop the French government from having a shitfit over the idea of Muslim girls wearing Hijabs in school, even though they had never gotten all huffy about Jewish boys wearing kippas. No, the people proposing bans on the wearing of those are small-minded bigots the same as the people who fight to prevent gay marriage. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/87 "2012-06-20T03:17:02Z")
> [@mister\_nyx](#): > > Perhaps you missed all of astro’s [del]concern trolling[/del] posts. Knock it off. You are not allowed to insult other posters in this forum. ---
**Author:** ![mister\_nyx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@mister\_nyx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_nyx)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/88 "2012-06-20T03:18:43Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > In fairness, while you’re undoubtedly more familiar with how straight people _openly_ react to you, he is presumably more familiar with how straight people react to you in other ways. If you think the perspective of one straight person as to his own attitudes trumps the average gay person’s experience with thousands of straight people’s reactions to them, I don’t know what to say. It’s not as hard as you might imagine to find out straight people’s attitudes in our culture. In fact, it’s quite easy. Comparing the additional perspective he gets from being inside one straight person’s head to the perspective I get from having specifically confronted this stuff from thousands of his fellows (and possibly from him in real life, for all I know), it’s sort of absurd to privilege his perspective as though it’s not one I’m familiar with. I’ve heard dozens if not more straight men say the same things he’s said to me – so while I’m not living in any of their heads, I’ve certainly heard the content before. > [@](#): > > Anyway, he wasn’t “grossed out”. He specifically noted that he wasn’t “squicked”, which I presume is roughly equivalent. He also repeatedly said that a TV commercial showing a tame kiss was alienating straight people (i.e. him, since there are plenty of straight people whom it doesn’t bother at all). It bothered him to the point that he suggested it was a bad idea. He said he was “more than a bit uncomfortable” and that it was a “visceral” response (isn’t that pretty much the definition of being “grossed out”?); the kiss was “transgressive” and just showing two men kissing would inevitably work against “tolerance and respect”. If you want to try to finesse his statements into him not being grossed out, enjoy your semantic gameplaying but at this point I’m not expecting you to come up with anything that changes my view of what he said. ---
**Author:** ![mister\_nyx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@mister\_nyx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_nyx)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/89 "2012-06-20T03:19:58Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Knock it off. You are not allowed to insult other posters in this forum. I explicitly addressed the posts, not the poster. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/90 "2012-06-20T03:34:49Z")
> [@mister\_nyx](#): > > I explicitly addressed the posts, not the poster. You’re not allowed to accuse other posters of trolling. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/91 "2012-06-20T03:41:58Z")
I just had the chance to watch the video, and (thinking of _Glee_), I’ve seen gay kissing scenes that lasted longer than that on US broadcast television. It’s my limited understanding that the UK has looser restrictions than the US when it comes to sexy television content, so I’d expect that kissing scenes even less of a big deal there than they are in the US. As for gay couples in TV ads, the one time I visited England, ten years ago, I saw an ad on TV several times that had a gay couple out shopping and it was portrayed as a very normal thing. I remember thinking you wouldn’t see an ad like that in the US. While I’m sure plenty of people who saw this ad didn’t \*like \*it, I’m thinking it probably wouldn’t be considered particularly extreme or shocking to the average British TV viewer. ---
**Author:** ![florez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9e5f3/32.png) [@florez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/florez)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/92 "2012-06-20T03:42:17Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > To presume women that wear them always have a choice is equally arrogant and ignorant.. No one said to presume women who wear traditional head covers always have a choice, but your statement was perhaps people have a point to their perception that “women wearing burkas or hijabs aren’t allowed a choice thereby subjecting them to a lesser station below men.” And IMO that is no different then looking down on any unfamiliar group, and applying stereotypes from your own phobic perspective. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/93 "2012-06-20T03:44:11Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > No, the people proposing bans on the wearing of those are small-minded bigots the same as the people who fight to prevent gay marriage. I won’t defend all bigots everywhere, I agree banning certain clothes is probably a silly thing to enforce at best, perhaps unlawful at worse. But to claim that ban as a purely hateful attack on a group equivalent to same sex marriage ban amendments is far fetched. Even in a free society, there are women without choice. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/94 "2012-06-20T03:45:05Z")
> [@mister\_nyx](#): > > If you think the perspective of one straight person as to his own attitudes trumps the average gay person’s experience with thousands of straight people’s reactions to them, I don’t know what to say. It’s not as hard as you might imagine to find out straight people’s attitudes in our culture. In fact, it’s quite easy. Comparing the additional perspective he gets from being inside one straight person’s head to the perspective I get from having specifically confronted this stuff from thousands of his fellows (and possibly from him in real life, for all I know), it’s sort of absurd to privilege his perspective as though it’s not one I’m familiar with. I’ve heard dozens if not more straight men say the same things he’s said to me – so while I’m not living in any of their heads, I’ve certainly heard the content before. > He also repeatedly said that a TV commercial showing a tame kiss was alienating straight people (i.e. him, since there are plenty of straight people whom it doesn’t bother at all). It bothered him to the point that he suggested it was a bad idea. He said he was “more than a bit uncomfortable” and that it was a “visceral” response (isn’t that pretty much the definition of being “grossed out”?); the kiss was “transgressive” and just showing two men kissing would inevitably work against “tolerance and respect”. > > If you want to try to finesse his statements into him not being grossed out, enjoy your semantic gameplaying but at this point I’m not expecting you to come up with anything that changes my view of what he said. Again, I must point you to the OP which asked a straightforward question I responded to with honesty and candor. I’m all for gay marriage, and gay rights, and yet at the same time seeing two men kiss each other in a physically intimate way is not something I particularly want to watch. That you seem unable to reconcile these two aspects without descending to name calling is your issue to resolve. On a further point re my use of the word “transgressive” the commercial was absolutely transgressive and quite deliberately so. That was the whole \*point \*of the commercial, to say “Hey look we’re people who can kiss in public too! Our love is as real and valid as yours!”. That you don’t seem to get this, but are as sensitive as a mimosa leaf to all other manner of perceived slights is puzzling. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/95 "2012-06-20T03:51:25Z")
> [@florez](#): > > No one said to presume women who wear traditional head covers always have a choice, but your statement was perhaps people have a point to their perception that “women wearing burkas or hijabs aren’t allowed a choice thereby subjecting them to a lesser station below men.” And IMO that is no different then looking down on any unfamiliar group, and applying stereotypes from your own phobic perspective. Civil rights are my phobic perspective? You think social constructs change miraculously when immigrants cross borders? ---
**Author:** ![mister\_nyx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@mister\_nyx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_nyx)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/96 "2012-06-20T03:54:14Z")
> [@astro](#): > > Again, I must point you to the OP which asked a straightforward question I responded to with honesty and candor. I’m all for gay marriage, and gay rights, and yet at the same time seeing two men kiss each other in a physically intimate way is not something I particularly want to watch. That you seem unable to reconcile these two aspects without descending to name calling is your issue to resolve. Actually, I didn’t engage in name-calling at all, and I limited my criticism to your attempts to argue against depicting a kiss on TV. I addressed your argument. You keep sliding away from your argument, and trying to make it appear you said something different than what you did. You tried to argue about what groups advocating marriage equality should show on TV. You are clearly uncomfortable with my responses to what you said, which is, obviously, why you’re describing them so deceptively. > [@](#): > > On a further point re my use of the word “transgressive” the commercial was absolutely transgressive and quite deliberately so. But you didn’t come up with any real reason why the commercial shouldn’t have transgressed this boundary. I agree that it was transgressive. That was part of the point. The problem for you, which you again fail to address, is explaining why they shouldn’t have transgressed in this way – since your only real reason is that it gives you a “visceral” negative reaction, and that’s not a real reason. > [@](#): > > That was the whole \*point \*of the commercial, to say “Hey look we’re people who can kiss in public too! Our love is as real and valid as yours!”. That you don’t seem to get this, but are as sensitive as a mimosa leaf to all other manner of perceived slights is puzzling. The only puzzling thing is why you feel that the fact that gay people can kiss in public, and have love that’s real and valid, is something we should try to hide. Feel free to advance that argument again, though. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/97 "2012-06-20T04:03:51Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > I won’t defend all bigots everywhere, I agree banning certain clothes is probably a silly thing to enforce at best, perhaps unlawful at worse. But to claim that ban as a purely hateful attack on a group equivalent to same sex marriage ban amendments is far fetched. Even in a free society, there are women without choice. So then if tomorrow a City Councilman in New York proposed a law forbidding Jewish New Yorkers from wearing Yarmulkas you would object if anyone called this an example of anti-Semitism and bigotry and you would think anyone who called it such would be overreacting? Moreover, people advocating bans on same sex marriage also insist that they’re not bigots and that what they’re proposing isn’t tantamount to discrimination. Both groups are equally wrong. They’re both engaging in bigotry. ---
**Author:** ![D-bear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@D-bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D-bear)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/98 "2012-06-20T04:05:55Z")
Sorry **Astro** , I know that you don’t want to come across as intolerant in the least, but… [QUOTE=1950’s Average White Male] I’m outraged! I was relaxing with my Banquet TV dinner in front of my new 7" DuMont and just after Kukla Fran and Ollie was over this **“Glee”** program came on. Can you believe that they have a COLORED child in class with all of these nice white kids? Her name was Mercedes… Probably a call back to Hitler’s bunch from the last war… They depicted her not only in the same classroom, but sharing all the same facilities. She ate at the same lunch table, did her daily calisthenics in the same gymnasium and actually drank FROM THE SAME DRINKING FOUNTAIN… A COLORED girl!!! I’m sending Senator McCarthy a strongly worded telegram via Western Union immediately! This kind of integration being shown is outrageous and will only serve to hurt all of society, white and dark alike! [/quote] Same bigotry, different decade… ---
**Author:** ![mister\_nyx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@mister\_nyx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_nyx)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/99 "2012-06-20T04:13:05Z")
> [@D-bear](#): > > Sorry **Astro** , I know that you don’t want to come across as intolerant in the least, but… > > Same bigotry, different decade… Ahahaha, high five! ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2012, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660/100 "2012-06-20T04:18:31Z")
That’s not even remotely comparable. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-gays-really-just-hurt-themselves-with-blatant-advertising/625660.md?page=6)