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May 04, 2006
Be a Man: Eat Shit!
Shakes here.
Last night, I saw these two commercials almost back-to-back…
TGI Friday’s: Four guys sit at a booth together. When their food is delivered, guy #1 stabs his steak and holds it up and growls, “Meat!” Guys #2 and #3 follow in kind. Stab. “Meat!” Guy #4 stabs a piece of broccoli and holds it up, saying, “Vegetable medley!” The other three guys all look at each other, then look at him with an expression that would best be translated as, “What are you—some kind of fag?!” Guy #4 sheepishly drops his broccoli, stabs a sausage and holds it up, saying, “Sausage!” They all cheer triumphantly. Guy #4 is a fag no more. You know, because he’s about to eat some sausage.
Burger King: A guy and a girl sit at a table together. The guy throws down his fork and jumps up into a song-and-dance routine, braying about how he’s not going to eat “chick food” anymore. He sings and dances his way to Burger King to get a ginormous burger, joined by other men who are all doing the same. The refrain of this song is “I am man, hear me roar, I’m incorrigible, I eat meat.” Spray-painted signs declaring “I Am Man” are unfurled off of overpasses. An Asian man in a business suit collapses onto the sidewalk, hungrily tearing into a Double Whopper. “I’ve eaten quiche, but I won’t anymore,” the men’s chorus sings. The men riot and toss a mini-van off a bridge, which lands in the back of a dump truck being towed by an old man clad in leather, who’s being led forward by a woman bearing a burger on a silver tray, just out of his reach. “I am man! I eat meat!”
I love the message here. It’s manly to eat meat—but not just any old meat; specifically the heart-stopping, artery-clogging beef served up by fast food and chain restaurants. It’s girly to eat vegetables and be healthy. Trying to save men from heart disease is just another part of the radical feminist agenda to “feminize” society. Damn women—if it weren’t for the mothers, girlfriends, and wives who try to get them to eat healthy, men would never have to subjected to the horror of broccoli! Damn henpecked hubbies and faggots—real men stuff their faces full of shit to prove how manly they are! Stunning.
Coincidentally, just yesterday I read this about one of the manliest men of them all, Dick “Quick Draw” Cheney:
The extent of his atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries, which, if it extends beyond the heart to the brain, can cause hard-to-recognize changes in cognition) is unknown. Bypass surgery itself has long been associated with subtle changes in neurological function. At age 65, Cheney is easily 30 or more pounds overweight, seems to have slacked off on what was once a more rigorous diet, and appears to suffer from recurrent bouts of gout. At a roundtable lunch with reporters a couple of years ago, two who were present say, he cut his buffalo steak in bite-size pieces the moment it arrived, then proceeded to salt each side of each piece.
Cool. Nothing quite says “manly” like recurring gout.
(Crossposted at Shakespeare's Sister.)
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Comments
Isn't it amazing how, whats the word, "immature" or maybe just fucking stupid American culture is. I was amazed when I took my first trip to Europe in 2003 how stuff seen a faggy over here (for ex: driving a Prius) is seen as smart and even patriotic over there.
More than the US politicians, its idiocy like these fast food commercials and the corruption of stuff like the History Channel (nightly 60 min. shows on Loch Ness, Big Foot, Life on Mars, the History of the Bulldozer (or Cannon), the History of Spontaneous Combustion...no BS, on now) that make me want to become an ex-pat.
Posted by: mark | May 4, 2006 12:02:39 PM
Ordering fast food from an overworked underpaid teenager looking weenie in a dumb uniform is manly? Haw! Haw! The only meat I eat is steak from mamouths I've brought down myself with my bow and arrow.
Posted by: Lance Mannion | May 4, 2006 12:03:41 PM
Medieval diseases for a medieval man.
Posted by: pantomimeHorse | May 4, 2006 12:25:41 PM
Lance makes a good point. The fast food places are so over the top just because they have to sell what is essentially shit. Its just missing the stick. Any self respecting man would eat at a real steakhouse to get his meat, or better yet cook it himself.
Although, I personally like chicken or fish just as much as steak sometimes. In any case, thanks for pointing it out Shakes. Really though, I just ignore and laugh at people who might take stuff like that seriously. If BurgerKing somehow is successful in perpertuating a retarded notion/stereotype, we only have our fellow citizens to blame, not them.
Posted by: Adrock | May 4, 2006 12:28:48 PM
The only meat I eat is steak from mamouths I've brought down myself with my bow and arrow.
And it is delicious. But if you don't stop dragging me by my hair to the table, I'm not coming over for supper anymore.
Posted by: Shakespeare's Sister | May 4, 2006 12:28:59 PM
All I know is I had the best short ribs of my life last night, and now I could braid my palm hair. In other news, I generally cook with tofu.
Posted by: Ezra | May 4, 2006 12:34:48 PM
In other news, I generally cook with tofu.
Call me when you get gout, girlyboy.
Posted by: Shakespeare's Sister | May 4, 2006 12:41:16 PM
Ezra, it's not eating your meat that gives you palm hair.
Posted by: Matt Weiner | May 4, 2006 12:58:06 PM
You should see the commercials about domestic pickup trucks. They might as well advertise a special chain on the back of the truck to drag the colors with when they look at a White Woman the wrong way.
Posted by: JR | May 4, 2006 1:28:54 PM
Matt, that was skillful.
Posted by: Neil the Ethical Werewolf | May 4, 2006 1:39:53 PM
Merci. I practice with heavyweights.
Posted by: Matt Weiner | May 4, 2006 1:47:17 PM
Im glad we get our proof of masculinity by eating impossibly hot curries after a few pints instead of such vile fare.
Posted by: dan | May 4, 2006 2:11:59 PM
So...having perceived manly traits seems to be a bad thing. Perhaps it quashes the notion that we are really all the same except for the external genetalia. Of course, that's not true at all! Just ask anyone who is married!!!
Posted by: Fred Jones | May 4, 2006 2:13:32 PM
No Fred, having heart disease is bad thing, and the test of manliness shouldn't be how determinedly you court it.
Posted by: Ezra | May 4, 2006 2:20:17 PM
Meanwhile, in so-fucking-stupid-he's-starting-to-make-sense(-in-that-bizarro-world-up-is-down-sorta-way) land, Andrew Sullivan moistens his chair over this effluvium about the neuterization of Johnny Lunchbucket: http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2006/05/quote_for_the_d_2.html
Posted by: Jimmm | May 4, 2006 2:22:07 PM
Meanwhile, in so-fucking-stupid-he's-starting-to-make-sense(-in-that-bizarro-world-up-is-down-sorta-way) land, Andrew Sullivan moistens his chair over this effluvium about the neuterization of Johnny Lunchbucket: http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/2006/05/quote_for_the_d_2.html
Posted by: Jimmm | May 4, 2006 2:22:08 PM
If Fred descended in self-parody, could anyone even notice? Perhaps he already did...
Posted by: djw | May 4, 2006 2:25:49 PM
I guess if I were Rudyard Kipling come back from the dead, I'd point out that what is being celebrated here isn't manliness, or "the" masculine virtues, but male adolescence. And there's a faux-victim discourse here: ordering greasy red meat is a way of defying The Man.
White prole males actually have every right to be angry, as their existence is less secure, economically and socially, since the waning of the labor movement. But they are misdirecting their anger if it's at people who tell them to eat their vegetables and to wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle.
Posted by: kth | May 4, 2006 2:59:48 PM
Damn, man. I just saw the Burger King commercial. You forgot to mention the burger is called the....
"TEXAS Double Whopper".
I will never buy anything from the Moron Meatsandwich Burger King shitsellers again.
Posted by: mark | May 4, 2006 3:27:47 PM
Both of these ads sound firmly tongue-in-cheek (especially the BK ad). I'm more concerned about the "it's still cute to scare men about being perceived as gay" than I am about what kth accurately calls celebrating male adolescent notions of sticking it to the man (and, as Sprint has noted, we all seem to think we can "stick it to the man" now, when some of us are, in fact, the man). And perhaps it's telling that so many men here seem intent on proving that they don't need to eat meat to prove their manliness, rather than "I don't care if anyone calls me gay or not." And all of this wouldn't matter if thinking, sensitive men amounted to amjor purchasing bloc; but the only thing advertisers know to do to get men to buy things in large numbers is to appeal to teenage boy fantasies and provide plenty of butch assurance.
And I hate tofu. Give me a good steak any time, and I'll probably have some fast food burgers too (though not that heart attack in a bag they're pushing at BK). Perhaps when manliness is not the issue, you can finally eat what you like. Which in my case is, er, meat. :)
Posted by: weboy | May 4, 2006 4:07:02 PM
What a completely superficial & pointless entry.
Posted by: Dustin | May 4, 2006 4:41:48 PM
What a completely superficial & pointless entry.
If Dustin is wrong, then his comment would seem to be superfical and pointless name-calling. If he is right, then his comment would seem to be pointless name-calling, with the added benefit of being meta-superficial and meta-pointless.
Posted by: paperwight | May 4, 2006 4:56:00 PM
Dustin:
Live a little.
Posted by: Kylroy | May 4, 2006 5:40:52 PM
There is a bio-chemical basis for all this. Meat, particularly red meat, raises testosterone levels. Soy is alleged to raise estrogen levels, though it may not be by a significant amount (but why take chances, I say).
Posted by: Steve | May 4, 2006 7:17:55 PM
Yeah, I'm totally sure that the marketing team at Burger King has bio-chemistry in mind when they came up with the riot imagery.
Posted by: aldahlia | May 4, 2006 8:43:36 PM
Not to brag, but I stopped eating at BK that time it took them 15 minutes to make a Crossonwich, at which point the Neandertal of a manager lurched out of his office, pointed at be-breasted me, and shouted "What is this gentleman waiting for?" Well, that and I kept biting into hard, clearly inedible objects in that soggy piece of shit they call a chicken sandwich.
Posted by: Kyso K | May 4, 2006 9:05:17 PM
Yeah, I remember seeing that BK commercial. It was late at night and I half convinced myself I had dreamed the whole thing. Then, today, I wake up...and I find out it's real! ARGGHHH!
Posted by: Blue Jean | May 4, 2006 9:43:19 PM
Obviously, it's manly to die of a massive heart attack at 42. Really. What, you're 84 and fit as a fiddle? What are you, some kind of nancy-boy?
And health concerns aside, I stopped eating at BK when I realized that their food tasted like crap.
Posted by: Dan | May 5, 2006 12:12:33 AM
One nice thing that I learned at parties in college... chicks love guys that can cook. You're at a party with 30 other people, and you're the one making breakfast for everyone. You get a lot of people that point out how the best cooks are male, and noone questions your manliness. ..of course if they did, then you just take their food away and they'd take it all back.
..my point? I think commercials like this are tuning in on one thing. 95% of people I've met don't know how to cook. Microwaving something with directions on the back is almost frightening to many people.
When you have a situation like that, people aren't going to be making wise decisions with their diet. They're going to eat anything they're told to eat, they don't have much other choice. As outright dumb as I thought that commercial was when I saw it...
Sadly it will probably work for a lot of guys. Its just got to get their attention and stroke their male Nascar ego for a few moments, prove it's not lame somehow, and you've got a new BK customer.
Posted by: david b | May 5, 2006 7:13:04 AM
W/regards to Americans eating crap, the other day I was buying a toaster oven. Several manufacturers specifically advertise that a 12" frozen pizza will fit in their oven. I also passed by the microwave aisle, which featured a Lenovo microwave with a frozen-pizza reheating oven built into its top.
Americans eat so much frozen pizza they now need special appliances to cook it all. I have stopped worrying about Social Security solvency--many Americans will not live long enough to retire.
Posted by: alex | May 5, 2006 12:24:26 PM
When exactly did it become manly to be stupid and irrational? Once upon a time, say, in the 18th and 19th, or even early 20th centuries, if you asked a man what the illogical, impulsive, anti-intellectual sex was, they would have said, "women." If you asked which sex was more likely to read a book and entertain serious ideas about it, they would have said, "men." Now "lads" are eager to have this idea turned on its head. There is a segment of men who WANT to be thought of as childish, it seems, in order to gain the license to act childishly. Some of these same men will also get petulant if they don't get respect from women, too. Go figure.
Posted by: ciocia | May 5, 2006 11:35:33 PM
When exactly did it become manly to be stupid and irrational?
Let's be honest and understand that this thread gets the amount of comments not because of the eating habits, but the for the opportunity of attacking perceived gender roles.
Posted by: Fred Jones | May 6, 2006 9:12:11 AM
I hope your medications for anxiety treatment will help me.
Thank you for the link.
Posted by: steven davies | Nov 12, 2007 12:17:49 PM
