Masculine guy in insurance commercial

[FairShake]

Pretty sure it's a parody. I think the mustache is proof.

 

[Serialized3]

I'm an introverted individual. What can I say? I like to think about stuff.

I dunno man, I have a very active mind as well and I only might notice something like this in passing if I had nothing better to do or think about, which is rare. Honestly, your mind can be used for so much more interesting, fun or productive things than posting online about fictional characters in insurance commercials.

 

[Stagger Lee]

I dunno man, I have a very active mind as well and I only might notice something like this in passing if I had nothing better to do or think about, which is rare. Honestly, your mind can be used for so much more interesting, fun or productive things than posting online about fictional characters in insurance commercials.

My point was the media presents certain things and this affects reality. Status is a majority of what makes a man attractive. The media presents what amounts to propaganda to brainwash viewers to see a certain group as lower status. To give you an extreme example, this is similar to what Nazi German did with the Jews. Of course the media is not that extreme, but it's not trivial either.

When the media presents one group as whipping boys and losers and another group as winners, the next logical step is for this to be acted out in real life. And it is. I know lots of women basically handed careers and WM discriminated against in employment. It's the media sterotypes being played out in reality. It's an intentional handicapping and placing a hurdle for one group and preferential treatment for others. If someone wants to ignore it fine. And if someone wants to call it out for what it is, I think that's fine too. But giving it tacit approval is another thing.

 

[user43770]

I dunno man, I have a very active mind as well and I only might notice something like this in passing if I had nothing better to do or think about, which is rare. Honestly, your mind can be used for so much more interesting, fun or productive things than posting online about fictional characters in insurance commercials.

I'm sure you have a lot going for you, man. Even so, you took the time to read this thread and comment on it. Taking a break from productivity?

 

[Rubirosa]

My point was the media presents certain things and this affects reality. Status is a majority of what makes a man attractive. The media presents what amounts to propaganda to brainwash viewers to see a certain group as lower status. To give you an extreme example, this is similar to what Nazi German did with the Jews. Of course the media is not that extreme, but it's not trivial either.

When the media presents one group as whipping boys and losers and another group as winners, the next logical step is for this to be acted out in real life. And it is. I know lots of women basically handed careers and WM discriminated against in employment. It's the media sterotypes being played out in reality. It's an intentional handicapping and placing a hurdle for one group and preferential treatment for others. If someone wants to ignore it fine. And if someone wants to call it out for what it is, I think that's fine too. But giving it tacit approval is another thing.

You my friend, are one articulate, intellegent MoFo

 

[Rubirosa]

You guys worry about too much irrelevant, weaksauce BS

Hey, read the caption of this forum section ("Anything Else"). We're using the appropriate place to discuss this. Or can't White guys complain now too ?

 

[Serialized3]

My point was the media presents certain things and this affects reality. Status is a majority of what makes a man attractive. The media presents what amounts to propaganda to brainwash viewers to see a certain group as lower status. To give you an extreme example, this is similar to what Nazi German did with the Jews. Of course the media is not that extreme, but it's not trivial either.

When the media presents one group as whipping boys and losers and another group as winners, the next logical step is for this to be acted out in real life. And it is. I know lots of women basically handed careers and WM discriminated against in employment. It's the media sterotypes being played out in reality. It's an intentional handicapping and placing a hurdle for one group and preferential treatment for others. If someone wants to ignore it fine. And if someone wants to call it out for what it is, I think that's fine too. But giving it tacit approval is another thing.

I understand your viewpoint (agree to a certain degree), and I can see if airing your opinions out on the message board lets you get your voice out and maybe sway some guys' opinions on here, and that's all well and dandy. But, I think in the bigger picture it is fairly wasteful of your precious time and energy to spend time thinking how some group of "others" is keeping you down, although it not is a waste of your time to acknowledge it and move on.

Honestly, I wonder how much of an effect these wacky insurance ads have on anyone. The OPs link had an silly "Anchorman" vibe about it, I think it's a sign of too much damn free time and stupid priorities that there are actually people writing newspaper articles about a very forgettable ad. Now that's something to might actually warrant discussion...

I tend to think advertisers are really going for the wallets for emerging demographics (women and minorities) like what Iceberg said. Of course, big corporations are almost always fairly callous and don't care who they steamroll over in their grab for cash, although it doesn't seem to be any vendetta against white males (despite what Pat Buchanan/Alex Jones/Henry Makow types might say). I think the best irony is how this system of corporatism is applauded by many conservatives, who tend to be white males, who seem to actually be undermining their own interests.

I'm sure you have a lot going for you, man. Even so, you took the time to read this thread and comment on it. Taking a break from productivity?

Yeah, I skimmed the thread and I commented on it. The message of this board has changed a lot over the past few years. There used to a lot more voices of reason and positivity on here. It's just so easy to blame things on a group of "others" (international zionists! ) rather than take responsibility for our own experiences. We all face challenges every day that are much, much more powerful than the "media influence" BS. Where you were born, what you look like, how much money your family has, and what kind of connections your family has all play a much, much bigger role than how you think the media portrays one of your characteristics.

We all have to face our shortcomings and overcome them without excuse. I realize that I may never bang a perfect 10 but you better believe that nothing is gonna stop me from trying, especially not because I'm upset that my race is portrayed as criminals/buffoons in the media, or whatever the case might be.

And yes, I did do a little work stuff on the computer today, but I am not one of the entrepreneurial acolytes on here that worship productivity - I try to leave work at work over the weekend. I am the work-to-live type.

I was just trying to fill that voice of reason part, so that you all wouldn't just reinforce each others opinions here. That's the surest way to get a pity party going.

Hey, read the caption of this forum section ("Anything Else"). We're using the appropriate place to discuss this. Or can't White guys complain now too ?

Sure, but just because you can do something doesn't mean you should do it, and it also leaves you open to criticism (although I never addressed you).

Yeah, and white guys have it so hard in this society. You would be hard pressed to find any white guys in a position of power. There are hardly any white congressmen, executives, managers, or professionals. Oh, wait ....

 

[Strelok]

Yeah, and white guys have it so hard in this society. You would be hard pressed to find any white guys in a position of power. There are hardly any white congressmen, executives, managers, or professionals. Oh, wait ....

The fact that 0,1% of white men are ceos,managers and executives doesnt mean white men in general are living a great life with no sh1t on them just because they are men and white.

However I do realise that it's hard to understand certain issues especially for those agencies who should make sure no one is persecuted because of his race or sex and who happen to employ women and minorities only.

So yeah crackas have the right to complain too.

 

[Atom Smasher]

"although it doesn't seem to be any vendetta against white males "

If you aren't aware of the existing vendatta against white males, you need to raise your awareness.

Companies pay BILLIONS of dollars per year specifically because their messages affect the masses. On TV, shows, it's perfectly ok for women to slap and punch white men. The male is almost always the disrespected, bumbling buffoon.

In TV ads, the male is routinely portrayed as a bumbling, confused oaf who has no idea how to take care of the problem at hand. Enter the woman who has just the right product and knows just what to do help him out of his confused state.

The modern media is the PRIMARY reason for the need of a site like this. The thought of the need of a resource like this would have been preposterous 30 years ago. Western culture is decaying from within, just as Old Honest Abe Lincoln predicted, and the media is the primary vastly effective tool for the powers that be (whether spiritual or otherwise) to destroy the family and thus the very fabric of Western civilization.

The power of subtlety and suggestion is enormous. Subtely and time are the super-weapons of the "information age", the modern era. A destructive paradigm, lacking in any kind of reality would be soundly ridiculed if posited directly.

But if, instead, that same paradigm is trickled into society's subconscious one tiny drop at a time, that paradigm will be embraced and accepted as reality within a couple of decades.

Finally, did you ever study the face of someone who is watching TV? They are in an absolute trance. Television is the fastest, most effective hypnoisis inducer there is. The trance occurs almost instantaneously. Take heed lest you become one of the inductees.

 

[Stagger Lee]

I blame a lot of the rapid social change that AS mentioned on cable tv and especially cable news networks. That's like 24/7 propaganda being broadcast. And even if you never watch it, enough other people do to spread the belief system. Before that the 3 braodcast news reported the facts and were required to actually be fair and balanced even if they did have a lean to the left. A lot has changed since the 80's and 90's.

I remember TV shows in the 80's on broadcast TV which everyone watched usually had a good vs bad theme, a man was the hero. It was a lot of family oriented stuff made to appeal to the man of the house and the kids and to a lesser extent the woman (she was busy cooking dinner or washing dishes anyway). Now what do you have? Crime investigation shows with the hero being the government and the government defines right and wrong, old women are considered sexy etc. The things you could do or say in the 80's would in the PC of today get your career ended, socially austricised and even arrested.

 

[Rubirosa]

Sure, but just because you can do something doesn't mean you should do it, and it also leaves you open to criticism (although I never addressed you).

Well, I did post on this thread before you, and your first post said "you guys"

That's beside the point, no offense taken here, but I am starting to get offended by, in my opinion, the barrage of advertising only using White males (and sometimes females) as the only examples of human stupidity. Just today I saw two examples : There was a commercial for Lawyers .com or something or another, and the cool, in control "host" was a woman of color (I believe she's a well known actress...I can't remember her name ) who's giving advice to a White woman as the White woman's husband is F@#king up the family car because he forgot to leave it in park or something. Not only that, but he panics like a child in the face of the situation. The commercial ends with both women contemplating him like he's a helpless infant.
The other commercial is quite funny actually, about a guy who admits he's not good with technology and he gets in to trouble with everything electronic (the ATM security bars trap him when he uses an ATM....).
Again, quite funny, but when a commercial blatantly infers that a guy is an idiot, they always seem to cast the same type; White male, 30's-40's, family type, Joe Blow

 

[Warrior74]

Well, I did post on this thread before you, and your first post said "you guys"

That's beside the point, no offense taken here, but I am starting to get offended by, in my opinion, the barrage of advertising only using White males (and sometimes females) as the only examples of human stupidity. Just today I saw two examples : There was a commercial for Lawyers .com or something or another, and the cool, in control "host" was a woman of color (I believe she's a well known actress...I can't remember her name ) who's giving advice to a White woman as the White woman's husband is F@#king up the family car because he forgot to leave it in park or something. Not only that, but he panics like a child in the face of the situation. The commercial ends with both women contemplating him like he's a helpless infant.
The other commercial is quite funny actually, about a guy who admits he's not good with technology and he gets in to trouble with everything electronic (the ATM security bars trap him when he uses an ATM....).
Again, quite funny, but when a commercial blatantly infers that a guy is an idiot, they always seem to cast the same type; White male, 30's-40's, family type, Joe Blow

Yup. That's the stereotype. Every group has a stereotype, no group likes theirs. Welcome to being like everyone else, you're not above being picked on. Rich people have stereotypes, poor people, blacks, gays, latinos, cheese eating surrender monkeys (the french), asians, jews.

And who are the people deciding to make these commercials? They certainly aren't the minorities in said commercials. I would imagine madison avenue is filled with men at the top, women in the middle and gays and jews sprinkled in between with a few token minorities.

The question you have to ask is this, is it a conspiracy? A world view? Or just basic human laziness?

I vote for basic human laziness.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BumblingDad

Born out of the Sitcom Dysfunctional Family, he's a deliberate subversion of the Father Knows Best design. Now so ubiquitous the older trope is nearly forgotten.
Although he's clever at times, he's not usually allowed to be smart. He has no idea that Shortcuts Make Long Delays. He's lazy, gluttonous and has miscellaneous other glaring vices. His children may love him, but they often don't respect him. However, he is still a sympathetic character; the source of his charm is his complete love and loyalty to his family, even if the main way he shows it is by fixing problems he caused himself.
His family is made up of at least one child nearing or in their teenage years, and a Closer to Earth wife (usually much prettier than Dad) who spends her time Parenting The Husband. If he has one or more teenage daughters, at least one will be a Bratty Teenage Daughter or a Daddy's Girl; whether they are or not, the dad will be an Overprotective Dad in regards to the girl(s).
Often used as an enabler of several Double Standards. Sometimes, on the rare occasions that a mom does something dumb, she's cut more slack than she otherwise would be, since the Bumbling Dad is there to make her look better by comparison. On the other hand, if everyone just gets used to tolerating Dad's incompetence, they might still hold Mom to the standards of a competent adult - in fact, she may end up being held responsible for fixing his screw-ups. After all, somebody's got to be the grownup in a family, and you can't hold Dad accountable for not acting like one if he's just an idiot. The frustrating and stagnant sexual roles enforced by this trope are often pointed to by feminists as a sign of how sexism hurts men as well as women.
This trope is still mostly seen in sitcoms and cartoons, along with many commercials, especially ones aimed at kids. In anime, this type of character is taken more respectfully, since it usually consists of a goofier dad, more involved with his family than the stereotypical Salaryman. This is even more common when his children have no visible mother.
This is an example of how a Subverted Trope can end up becoming the norm. Back in the day, fathers were assumed to be wise and in charge, and the Bumbling Dad was something fresh and unusual. Today, sitcoms have made Bumbling Dad almost a Dead Horse Trope, and consistently competent fathers are practically a subversion.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TokenTrio

The Power Trio's answer to the Five Token Band. As with most of Tokenkind, group members typically exhibit absolutely no personality—at least, when they're in a commercial. Which they usually are.
If you want to sell a product like, say, Lucky Captain Rabbit King Nuggets to kids, you put kids in the commercials. That's basic demographic appeal. But you can't cast just any kids— you want three, all implied to be friends, and for a mix of reasons— political correctness, as well as representing the largest target demographics in the Western world with a minimum of actual effort —you choose:
a white male
a black male, or other visible minority
a white female (increasingly often a female of yet another minority as to go two for two)
The end result manages to combine Token Minority and The Smurfette Principle: the Token Trio. Implicit in all cases is that the white male is the de facto head of the Three Amigos—at the least, he'll play a more prominent visual or verbal role in the commercial. Only on rare occasion will the girl be recognizably a third race, such as Asian. And the black one naturally will be not very black.
Even outside of advertising, this is an incredibly frequent attribute of the Three Amigos, where the white guy's status as The Hero is essentially guaranteed. Larger variety is Five Token Band.
The Scott Westerfeld novel So Yesterday termed this phenomenon the 'Missing Black Woman Formation,' or MBWF.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RaceTropes


http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MenAreGenericWomenAreSpecial

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MenAreTheExpendableGender

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheUnfairSex


Sorry to inform you. But this is how the sausage is made.

 

[Ninja Dude]

Hey, read the caption of this forum section ("Anything Else"). We're using the appropriate place to discuss this. Or can't White guys complain now too ?

Sure they can. Just not as much

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG4f9zR5yzY

 

[Rubirosa]

Yup. That's the stereotype. Every group has a stereotype, no group likes theirs. Welcome to being like everyone else, you're not above being picked on. Rich people have stereotypes, poor people, blacks, gays, latinos, cheese eating surrender monkeys (the french), asians, jews.

If you're suggesting that White males are stereotyped as being stupid, then so be it, but the point is that advertising chooses to exploit this stereotype for laughs, whereas it does not use other racial/ethnic stereotypes for laughs. So in essence, we are not like everyone else when it comes to portrayal in advertising.

 

[Ninja Dude]

Ohhh, boohoo. The ads are making fun of me! All I can do now is sulk while I wonder how to spend the additional 30% I make just because of my complexion. Sooooo tough being a white guy!

Beyond this pointless race argument, I just gotta say its frikkin sad how young men are so bereft of positive role models that they will post and pontificate over one that they saw for 30 seconds in a commercial. SMH

 

[FairShake]

Wanna know WHY this stereotype is so visible in media? Because nobody really believes it. Women, gays, and racial minorities do not think we're stupider than them and certainly don't treat us like they do. White males CERTAINLY don't believe we're stupider than other groups.

If anything, SOME women, gays, and racial minorities sometimes think we're smarter than them though most wouldn't admit it. These commercials have no meaning and don't hurt us at all as long as we continue to disproportionately run the world.

Edit: Oh yeah, and SOME White males treat women, gays, and racial minorities like they're stupider than us. Hence why they like commercials and TV turning that around. They do outnumber us you know!

 

[Rubirosa]

Ohhh, boohoo. The ads are making fun of me! All I can do now is sulk while I wonder how to spend the additional 30% I make just because of my complexion. Sooooo tough being a white guy!

Beyond this pointless race argument, I just gotta say its frikkin sad how young men are so bereft of positive role models that they will post and pontificate over one that they saw for 30 seconds in a commercial. SMH

Lighten up dude (No pun intended)....I'm not "crying" because White men are portrayed as stupid in commercials. I'm aggravated that only White men are used for this comic role and other ethnicities are not. Why can't they show a stupid acting Black guy where a White woman contemplates him like he's a helpless infant ? BTW that video you posted was very funny. And thanks for referring to me as young.

 

[Martin Shabazz Jr.]

Why can't they show a stupid acting Black guy...

That's what the movies are for. If white guys have it bad in commercials, minorities have it just as bad or worse in the cinema.

The conspiracy theorist in me would like to believe that this is a tool the powers that be use to keep the sheeple(us) bickering amongst themselves but who knows and more importantly who cares? Why are you even watching TV anyway?