July 23, 2008

Gay Snickers, or just boring straight nuts?

There has been some kerfuffle about "homophobic" advertising on American television by snack bar company Snickers. One advert, played during that man-love fest, the Superbowl, featured two guys nibbling on each end of a bar then meeting in the middle (Lady & The Tramp spaghetti eating style, if you remember that) for a snog and inevitable ending in an assertion of heterosexual chest-hair ripping masculinity:



Then there is the recent one featuring Mr T shooting up a mincingly speed-walking athlete, encouraging him to "get some nuts":


UPDATE: The Mr T advert has now been withdrawn.

All a far cry from the Snickers ads down under, which I have always liked because of their quite homo-erotic scenarios involving those surfer boys. Here's one of the Australian versions:


How come a company like Snickers approves such diametrically opposed imagery in their advertising in different countries?

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