So why are they all so mad at her?
Women are upset about a Sydney Sweeney ad . . . again. I hate the ad, but this shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. It promotes a sports betting website called Novig starring a very nude Sydney Sweeney clad in nothing but sports gear — only the classiest advertisements for a company whose goal is to lure men into gambling addictions.
The video has since sparked outrage from young women, female athletes in particular. One X post complains that “for every act of micro feminism i do sydney sweeney sets feminism 100 years back.” Upon seeing the post, I thought to myself, “Is this not feminism?” By all fourth-wave accounts, Sydney Sweeney should be a feminist icon — so why do women hate her?
This isn’t the first time Sydney Sweeney has received backlash for one of her ads. Last summer, controversy surrounding her partnership with American Eagle denim circulated the internet after the company used the phrase, “Sydney Sweeney has good jeans.” Some thought it was a clever play on words; others saw it as a nod to white supremacist or eugenicist imagery. Now, women are giving Sweeney the same treatment for her Novig ad.
To be fair, the ad is objectively crude and borderline pornographic. However, Sweeney chose to do the ad. She had complete autonomy over her body, what she did with it, and who she wanted it shown to (everyone). She got paid, and she holds a direct equity stake in the company. Novig CEO Jacob Fortinsky even revealed that “it really was Sydney who’s driving a lot of the visuals and the messaging.”
Whether or not one agrees with how she used her autonomy should be beside the point for a fourth-wave feminist. She had the choice to monetize her body, and she did. But apparently, the nude sports betting ad isn’t exactly what feminists meant when they said “her body, her choice.”
I don’t like the ad because it promotes both the sexualization of women and gambling; most conservatives believe both of these things are morally corrosive. This perspective isn’t new. Other women, many of whom I’m sure are self-proclaimed “feminists,” don’t like the ad because they claim Sweeney either (a) misrepresented women’s sports and female athletes, (b) set women back 500 years, or (c) both.
First, Sweeney does not claim to be an athlete in the video. It advertises sports betting, not women’s sports. Fortinsky once again responded to the outrage, explaining that, “We never intended to portray female sports.”
Female athletes, however, are unconvinced and unimpressed with this explanation. Abigail Anthony addresses their hypocrisy in her most recent piece, “Sydney Sweeney Manages to Clear Up the Sports World’s Gender Confusion.”
“Female athletes have been largely silent in response to males entering women’s divisions,” says Anthony. “The theoretical social harm that Sweeney is facilitating against female athletes is somehow more deserving of condemnation than the policies and male athletes that have obviously harmed women and girls.”
The same level of “the selective political outrage” and “striking hypocrisy,” as Anthony aptly puts it, can also be said of the broader current feminist movement. Women claim that this ad “sets women back 500 years” as if this isn’t what they have been supporting for the past two to four decades. How is this ad any different from a woman’s, now encouraged and even celebrated, ability to strip, be a prostitute, or do OnlyFans?
Writer Harriet Walker put out a video on instagram for The Times in which she says, with a rather condescending air, “Let me first say the words every woman must when another woman takes her clothes off for money or attention: how empowering to have made that choice for yourself and your body!”
She goes on to say, “Now that’s out of the way, let me follow it with what we say to each other in private: ugh, really? Because whenever a woman is pointlessly and publicly naked like this, the rest of us are taken less seriously. We used to push back on women’s bodies being collateral for men’s attention.”
We did, but in a stunning reversal, instead of condemning such behavior, modern-day feminists applaud it with smiles plastered on their faces because it’s what’s socially acceptable. Go figure.
Feminism has come full circle. What started as a suffragist movement to fight for women’s right to vote and equal opportunity in the workplace — the many female writers at NR are proof of the success of the first and second waves of feminism — has turned into a movement that packages degradation as empowerment. Stripping and pornography are perfect examples of this twisted logic; as long as you’re getting paid for it, what’s the harm? If men are going to degrade you, might as well get some cash from it. Your body, your choice.
However, the current outrage suggests that some women reserve their righteous fire of feminist condemnation for only the hottest and the most Republican women among us. The way they’re reacting, you would think Sweeney had strangled her three children — too soon?
Today’s feminists are right about one thing — take a picture of that one, folks, because that admission doesn’t happen often — the ad is in poor taste, and it is morally degrading. I am glad young women have come out against the ad, and I hope they maintain this same level of animosity for stripping, OnlyFans, and prostitution. Alas, I can’t imagine they will, but a girl can dream.