The campaign that Sydney Sweeney launched with great fanfare a few days ago has become the target of harsh criticism from female athletes and other users who question the “sexualization of sports.”
In the controversial advertisement, the Euphoria actress promotes the Novig platform, a sports prediction space for betting. The camera portrays Sweeney naked, covering her private parts with footballs, basketballs, and other sports equipment.
According to CNN, one of the videos reached more than 37 million views in four days.
Although the provocative concept of the ad achieved the goal of viralization, it also put Sweeney in the middle of heavy criticism. Such a negative response has been felt on the actress’s social media.
According to data from the analytics firm Social Blade cited by Variety, Sweeney gained around 50,000 followers during the first three days after the ad’s release. However, on Sunday she lost 136,848 followers and on Monday another 68,000 as questions about the campaign grew.
In total, more than 200,000 people unfollowed her on Instagram during that period. The figure, however, still represents less than 1% of her more than 25 million followers.
For her part, Sweeney seems to dismiss the detractors. On Sunday, she reposted photos and videos related to the commercial. She also shared on her Instagram stories covers of ESPN The Magazine’s Body Issue, a publication that for years featured naked or semi-naked athletes.
Several high-performance athletes publicly shared why they consider Sydney Sweeney’s campaign negative. Australian swimmer Ariarne Titmus, a four-time Olympic champion, directly criticized the fact that women’s bodies are still used as an advertising resource.
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“I cannot describe how infuriated I feel when I see this,” wrote Titmus. “How do we live in a world where monetizing a woman’s body and sexualizing women’s sports is still commonplace?”, she added.
Australian surfer Felicity Palmateer argued that such advertisements are harmful to women who play sports and to girls who want to get started in a discipline. “We want to be valued for what we can do, not for how we look,” she told CNN. Source: Infobae
