Selling Lust: Sydney Sweeney’s Great Jeans
How Outrage and Marketing Collide in a Viral Ad
A Warning to Christian Men
First, if you haven’t seen the ad yet, don’t. Just trust me. It’s probably not the most provocative ad you’ve ever seen, but it’s provocative enough—and as a Christian, especially a Christian man, guard your eyes, mind, and heart.
The Manufactured Outrage Machine
To the point: Most everyone is talking past each other. Progressives are co-opting the “great jeans” line to decry racism. White supremacists are using it as a dog whistle to defend their tribe. And many white Christians, tired of anti-white bias, are keen to come along for the ride. Whoever dreamed up this marketing campaign was clever, but spiritually bankrupt.
Some execs in a boardroom cast a conventionally attractive white woman with blonde hair and blue eyes to seductively deliver the double entendre of “great jeans/genes.” Once the ad drops, outrage and commentary explode across social media—much of it amplified by influencers who are themselves paid by corporate interests with intertangled business interests. Suddenly, your little commercial about jeans becomes international news, replayed on television, the web, and everywhere else—now everyone knows who American Eagle and Sydney Sweeney are. Bam. (And if not, consider yourself one of the lucky ones.)
Notice how this dynamic works both ways: one camp spins it as evidence of racism, another as an attack on “beautiful white women,” and outrage feeds itself in a viral loop. Watch as white men everywhere rise up as triumphant extra-white knights!
Christian Response: Don’t Defend the Indefensible
I’ve seen a few Christians trying to defend the ad. I’m not sure if they’ve actually seen it. Over and over I hear, “They just hate that it’s a pretty white girl!” I just hate it because it’s a woman sexually objectifying herself for profit while inviting men to commit adultery in the heart—“But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28, LSB). One can be beautiful and feminine, and even show the feminine form, without being immodest. Sydney Sweeney throws herself over that line with abandon.
As Christians, we shouldn’t be defending public harlotry in the name of our “white” tribe. Proverbs 7 describes the seductive woman who “dresses herself as a harlot and cunning of heart,” whose “house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death” (Proverbs 7:10, 27, LSB). Honor Christ as Lord—and His commands above all else.
As Christians, we have an objective standard which tells us the difference between beauty and immodesty. God made woman as the “glory of man” (1 Cor 11:7). This isn’t a derogative, but a praise. She is the glory. Beauty is a feature, not a coincidence, of femininity, and it should be praised and highlighted. But what contemporary culture does is take that glory, exploit it, consume it, and violate it.
As God’s ambassadors, we renege on our sacred duties when we join in on the crooked festivities of the culture, defending Sydney Sweeney exposing herself to hawk jeans and views, because we value white America more than the imago Dei.
No Apologies for Truth
Don’t misunderstand my strong language as an attempt to disparage Sydney Sweeney—the reality is, she sexually objectifies herself for profit. What is truly beautiful should be celebrated. But when Sweeney doesn’t just tempt, but actively invites the imagination to her unbuttoned pants and practically uncovered cleavage, she is, definitionally, playing the role of a harlot (Proverbs 7). As a person made in God’s image, she—like all of us—is called to honor God with her body.
We can’t mince words simply because feminism and progressive (regressive?) societal values have compromised biblical morality.
The advertising agency succeeded: I wrote an article about their ad campaign. May God in His providence accomplish His own purposes.
