Victor Davis Hanson on Outrage Over Sydney Sweeney Jeans Ad and the History of Eugenics

Outrage Over Sydney Sweeney Jeans Ad

• 👖 A recent American Eagle jeans commercial featuring Sydney Sweeney, with the tagline "great genes" (with "gene" crossed out and replaced by "jeans"), has sparked outrage on the left.
• 🤯 Critics accused the ad of "objectifying whiteness," promoting eugenics, and even compared it to Nazi propaganda.

Double Standards in Advertising

• ⚖️ The speaker contrasts the reaction to the Sweeney ad with a Levi's ad featuring Beyonce in a country-western setting with a blonde wig.
• 🚫 While the Beyonce ad, which emulated white culture, faced no objections, the Sweeney ad was deemed problematic for its focus on natural beauty.
• 💡 The core of advertising is to suggest that a product can enhance attractiveness, as seen in the theory that American Eagle jeans can make one more like Sydney Sweeney.

Classical Beauty and Proportion

• 🏛️ The ad also implicitly promotes a return to classical ideals of beauty, based on proportion and mathematics, as described by Aristotle.
• ✨ This concept suggests that certain physical proportions are universally perceived as beautiful, a notion that is being challenged in contemporary culture.

Historical Context of Eugenics

• 🔬 The term "eugenics" is historically linked to a progressive movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, not the right wing.
• ⚠️ Prominent figures associated with eugenics include Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Helen Keller, Margaret Sanger (founder of Planned Parenthood), and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
• 🔄 It is ironic for the left to accuse others of eugenics given this historical association, suggesting a need to re-examine figures like Margaret Sanger.

Universal Appreciation of Beauty

• 💖 Both Beyonce and Sydney Sweeney are beautiful due to their symmetry, a universal concept according to Aristotle, transcending skin color or contemporary cultural biases.
• 🌟 This appreciation for proportion and symmetry is presented as a timeless ideal that contrasts with current cultural hysteria.