“Sydney Sweeney has great jeans,” the American Eagle ad campaign released in July, stood out for the retailer’s stylish jeans and, unfortunately, white supremacist undertones.
This 30-second ad, followed by many other “shorts,” centers on the American actress Sydney Sweeney, who has blond hair and blue eyes. In one spot, she says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
These advertisements have made a huge impact online, as people have been deconstructing these videos and their offensive implications.
American Eagle’s use of the phrase “great jeans” is a dangerous play on words concerning the word jeans and genes that some critics have said harks back to eugenics, a long discredited scientific theory that we can selectively breed humans to improve the human race.
It raises a question many viewers had when seeing this advertisement: how does this message draw in audiences to buy this product? The simple answer is, it doesn’t. Instead, it not only invokes racism but sends a message to the young women of America: If you aren’t blonde, white and skinny, your “genes” are not desirable.
The ad campaign focuses less on the overall function of the jeans and more on Sydney Sweeney herself. The poses and demonstrations of the product American Eagle has Sydney do are oddly sexualized and overly objectifying, two aspects that I find unnecessary in persuading audiences to buy the jeans.
It showcases how good she looks in the jeans, but what about how you would look? The overall lack of representation and sole focus on someone who fits conventional beauty standards not only minimizes the concerns of their audience but continues to hold space for an impossible standard of beauty.
No one watching these advertisements is thinking: if I buy these jeans, I will look just like her! And American Eagle knows that. I and many others speculate that American Eagle did this on purpose, knowing that this would cause a controversy. But why? What do they gain by releasing such a provocative and deliberate display of racism? Besides the hate and even support, there is one thing they have managed to extract from all of their viewers: attention.
Despite the many negative interpretations of the ad, American Eagle has continued to stand by it and has since refused to apologize. A statement they made in early August responding to the backlash said, “Great jeans look good on everyone,” and that the campaign “is and always was about the jeans.”
But we know it’s about much more than that. American Eagle has used this controversy to also broaden the conversation on politics and beauty representation, granting them the spotlight in both their own campaign and existing cultural issues.
Many companies have clapped back at the American Eagle campaign, such as Gap with their jeans ad featuring the girl group Katseye in late August. Gap’s ad was seen as a direct counter to American Eagle’s campaign, as Gap was featuring different ethnicities and body types throughout this inclusive and dance-focused advertisement.
The diversity and positivity displayed in Gap’s advertisement are something that American Eagle failed to do. Gap’s jeans ad succeeded in grabbing the attention of its audience and making a display of unity that shows the power our differences hold.
Displays of racism like Sydney Sweeney’s American Eagle advertisement hold our society down and limit our expression of our unique features and overall individuality. Whether you still believe this advertisement was intentional or not, I hope you have, regardless, gathered a new understanding of how modern racism and beauty standards continue to shape society in damaging ways.
