I’m pretty sure I saw that ad on the snopes board, at least a year ago. It was judged then to be a fake.
It’s a fake as in Puma didn’t commission them but an actual ad agency did do them on spec. Puma never wanted to go with them, though.
It’s
- probably supposed to be a high-school girl
- giving a guy a blowjob in what looks to be a hallway (not that you can see much of the background)
- while wearing Puma-branded accessories
So what’s the marketing angle here? “Hey girls, buy Puma stuff and you, too, can be the school skank”? Or “Hey guys, buy your girlfriend Puma stuff and she’ll give you head between class”?
Remember, the ad has women’s sneakers and a purse. It might be different (although still stupid) if it showed a hot guy giving head to the Puma-wearing chick. This is pure male wish-fulfillment, to sell items marketed to women. Dumb.
It’s dumb but I don’t see it as offensive. I also didn’t assume that the girl was high school aged.
Agreed. Frankly, I find it offensive that giving head is considered to be degrading or insulting to women. (Not accusing any poster here of this, just saying.) First off, is the reverse considered to be true? No, not that I can tell. And secondly, wouldn’t that make the guy just as much in the wrong to be degrading someone that way? I mainly view it as an offshoot of the whole “having sex makes a girl bad/defiled” thing, which is, obviously, offensive. /random rant.
Yeah, sex is great. Fully clothed in a hallway, or wherever they are? This is sexy because why?
More important, to me, at least, is that the ad reinforces the idea that women should be hot and stylish so they can provide sexual services to men. Who’s having fun in that picture? Do you see anything about the ad that makes you think the guy’s going to return the favor? Seriously, who would design this image on the assumption that it’s going to be attractive to women? I mean, it’s not like the average young woman has a hard time finding men who might like a random blowjob. They could at least have put a hot guy in the ad, rather than a featureless pair of jeans.
I’m not one of them (I’m too wussy to enjoy it), but I hear a lot of people get off having sex in public places, because it’s forbidden and you might get caught. Plus, hormones/the sex drive are powerful. I’d bet good money people have willingly and happily had sex in much worse places. I assumed they were in a bathroom, by the way.
Edit 1: Lost sight of the goal, it being an ad and all: no, I don’t find it sexy either. Well, maybe a little titillating, as I find all images of people engaging in sexual activity to be so. Doesn’t make me want to buy shoes either, but that’s not surprising, given it was never approved to be a publicly-run ad in the first place.
Arg. Edit 2: I mean, obviously it’s a bad ad, even the company agrees on that. So rating its effectiveness as an ad is bound to be rather pointless.
In and of itself, it’s not. However, there is a history, at least in the U.S., of women being expected to provide oral sex to men, without any reciprocal expectation. The particular positioning they’re using is indicative of a power relationship, too–the man is standing while the woman crouches/kneels in front of him. When was the last time you saw a man perform oral sex on a woman that way?
Oh, I’ve seen it…
What history? There’s a history of oral sex in general being verboten, but there’s no “blowjobs-only!” culture.
Think about even current teeange culture. How many of the girls do you think are performing oral sex? And how many of the guys?
Why, sure there is. I know heaps of men who will gladly accept a blowjob but refuse to go down. I know of considerably fewer who feel they’re obligated to reciprocate.
I’m sure it’s been mentioned. but probably the UK Conservative MEP quoted (on video) as saying something like
“Just like in business, any self respecting MEP wouldn’t dream of employing a woman of child-bearing age. That’s true, right? right?”
It’s entirely possible I haven’t got the quote exactly right, but I can’t find a cite on the internet.
Check out the “women who don’t…” and “men who don’t…” threads in IMHO. There were more women than men who said they wouldn’t.
Not a very accurate representation. You’re talking self-selected responses from an already demographically limited population.
Oh, I know. But you said, “there’s no “blowjobs-only!” culture”, and I was saying that I know of plenty of guys who belong to just such a culture.
And even if there are more women who don’t than men who don’t, that doesn’t preclude the possibility that there are still a lot of men who don’t, but who would like to meet a woman who does.
What are the ethical considerations in asking a hermaphroditic individual to help move a couch? 
Anyway, I wanted to share one story that sticks out in my mind… Not the worst thing I’ve ever experienced, but recent.
I was on the train heading home from work when we stopped at Addison after a ball game (Red Line stop at Wrigley Field here in Chicago). A drunk guy with his arm around his girlfriend gets on, and as the train was full of commuters going home, there were no seats available. He then says, loud enough for everyone to hear, “There used to be a time when people would give up a seat for a pretty blonde girl!”
No one gets up.
At the next stop, someone gets up to leave. The guy escorts his girl over to the seat and says, “Oh, here you go, babe,” as though the idea to sit down in the only vacant seat could have never occurred to her without his assistance.
Ugh, it just really ticked me off. Blech. Guys who treat their girlfriends like thoughtless lemmings.
You’ve mentioned this elsewhere. For the life of me, I’ve never seen this done. Perhaps it’s a regional thing; I don’t know.
Yeah. I’m female and I’ve never had this done. Well, the creepy guys when I used to live up in Harlem would always do it and it was creepy. But other than a few appreciative comments when I’m looking awesome, I usually don’t get that kind of comment or whatnot. I do usually have an MP3 player on.
Well, to start with, you’d probably want to refer to them as intersexed if you want them to do you a favor. 