Here’s a sunny and completely problem free topic… Eugenics! For those unfamiliar, “eugenics” is a term coined by Charles Darwin’s cousin, Sir Francis Galton. Basically it’s selective breeding in humans for specific traits like eye color, hair color, intelligence, etc. Eu from the Greek meaning “good” and genos meaning “well-born”. Darwin’s theory gave the framework for heredity and Galton mis-applied those theories socially, advocating reproduction between young people with “desirable traits”. It wasn’t really a new idea, though. Spartans did it, breeding the strongest warrior stock and we know what wonderful people they were (I.e. rapists, child molesters, etc.) and the practice of “selective breeding” was discussed in Plato’s Republic which included descriptions of state controlled breeding (bloodlines and political control) hidden by public festivals that were organized by the rulers and the the culling of children born with undesirable traits or by unapproved pairings. You know, another just… horrific douche… that thought this was a wonderful concept was Adolf Hitler who considered it a wonderful way to “keep the races pure”.
Recently, eugenics has been brought back into the fore front of public awareness with, of all things, an add for blue jeans. I want to say right here, I don’t think that’s what that was… advocating for racial purity or a eugenics utopia or whatever. I think it was maybe a little tone deaf in today’s climate of old white guys vs pretty much anyone not old, white, or a guy. But I think the add was probably a riff on older ads by another jean company, Calvin Klien. They did it first and, I think, better with star Brooke Shields who is still to this day much prettier and more talented that Sidney Sweeney on her best day, but I guess that’s just my opinion. In this ad, Brooke is reciting something written by the art department to sound like it came from the pages of “Origin of Species” but it was, in fact, just something that was written for the ad, just like the American Eagle ad. The problem is, perception. When the Brooke ad aired, there wasn’t a neo-nazi… I’m sorry… “white nationalist” movement being fed by an entire political party making it OK to be racist. Sure, racism existed then as it does now, but these days, the president makes it OK to be racists by calling them “very fine people” when they march with tiki torches and threaten black voters at poling stations. You may also hear “Beyonce is a black lady and she did a jeans ad too!” but the salaciousness of the ad is not the problem…. It’s the implied / perceived racism in the American Eagle ad.
I have heard that American Eagle’s response (pictured right) to the backlash contained a bunch of coded dog whistles, but hey… I’m no expert. I don’t typically count letters to see if there’s an 88 or some other coded message in publicly releases. There very well may be, but I can tell you, they did it wrong. Instead of an “I’m so sorry you took it that way, we were just playing off an old commercial” they doubled down. That’s not a good look American Eagle.
So, what have we learned? We have learned that people won’t put up with even a perceived implication of injustice and that… while this whole thing is silly… gives me hope. Hope that we have not lost our attitude of “Not in my house you don’t!”
“Eugenics is a thing no more to be bargained about than poisoning; it is not a matter of degree or method, but of whether such a thing should be done at all.” ~ G. K. Chesterton