The Ben Mulroney Show - The Sydney Sweeney ad debacle rages on

Episode Date: August 5, 2025

 - Tony Chapman If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Twitter: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ TikTok: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a paid advertisement for better help. These days, it feels like everywhere you turn, someone's got a new theory on how to improve your mental health, from ice baths to meditation apps. There's a lot of noise out there about what's supposed to make you feel better. But the truth is, finding what actually helps you isn't always that simple. When it comes to mental health, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. That's why speaking with someone who is trained to listen and to help,

someone who can meet you where you are and help you figure things out can make such a difference. Trust me, I know what I'm talking about. BetterHelp connects people with mental health professionals from around the world offering access to a huge range of experiences and expertise. They've worked with millions of people already and with thousands of therapists available,

it is easy to find somebody who fits your needs. It's flexible, too. You can schedule a session with just a click and you're free to change therapists whenever you need to until you find the right fit. Talk it out with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Mulruni today to get 10% off your first month.

That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Mulruni. This is the Ben Mulroney show. Thank you for joining us on this, Tuesday, August 5th. Appreciate your time. This is, we got to talk about a concert that in my mind is not a controversy. It is an example of hypocritical outrage by people who need to be outraged or they are out of a job. And I'm talking specifically of the Sydney

Sweeney ad controversy, right? This, I guess it started early last week where American Eagle dropped an ad campaign of Sidney's Sweeney saying Sydney Sweeney has good genes and it's selling jeans. And so Sydney Sweeney has great genes. And the cries from the left were significant and pretty much nonstop, claiming that this was harkening back to Nazism and eugenics because she's white and she's blonde with blue eyes, and this is the Nazi image of perfection. It's all BS. It's all BS. This was about her genetics and the fact She had blonde hair. The ad also apparently had pushback more widely for being overly sexualized and out of touch reminiscent of previous marketing norms that may say no longer resonate with the public.

This is the same public that apparently will buy concert tickets for songs about, you know, wet WAP. I can't say that. Yeah, please, please do not. Right. So like you got to pick a lane, right? So to those who are attacking Sidney Sweeney, she is either over-sexualizing yourself or if she were a sex worker, you would say that she has agency over her sexuality, that she is a woman in complete control of her body and she can do what she wants with it. But you've decided in this case that it's better to attack her than to actually have the courage and consistency of your convictions. and these people calling it Nazism

are also walking shoulder to shoulder with actual Nazis on the streets of North America. These are people standing shoulder to shoulder with other people calling for the murder of all Jews, the destruction of Israel, the liquidation of the Jews, another Holocaust. There are people actually doing the Nazi salute next to the people that you support.

That's real. Nazism. This is an ad for jeans by a hot chick with big boobs. That's what it is. And I get it. You live in a world where there has to be a victim. In every situation, there must be a victim. And there must be somebody perpetrating a crime on that victim. And in this case, it's the patriarchy and the male gays and Nazis and white people doing something bad. Just because a white person sells genes doesn't mean a black person can't sell jeans. As a matter of fact, when Beyonce had her gene at the Super Bowl, we all lost our collective minds on how awesome it was. And nobody said that that was exclusionary to everybody else. This is situational hypocrisy.

This is outrage for the sake of outrage. And it's a spent force. How do I know it's a spent force because American Eagles stock price has gone up 23 or 24%. People don't care anymore about what you have to say about any, any little thing that you are outraged over. This is the same thing as back in the day when people took offense to jokes. Oh, that joke is offensive. No, no. That joke is offensive to you. This ad is offensive to you. It is not offensive. Effectively, you just don't like it because it doesn't fit with your worldview, or rather it does fit with your worldview, if you interpret it in a way that is asinine and nonsensical and juvenile and devoid of nuance.

That's all it is. And not for nothing, the most strident voices against Sidney-Sweeney are women. I've said it before. Toxic femininity is a thing, and we were watching it play out in real time. Here is a successful independent woman who is able to move. the needle for a brand like American Eagle, you don't like it. So you're attacking her. How much you're telling her? Well, Sidney Sweeney was heckled at a premiere. Let's listen. Stop the ad. That it's being racist.

Yeah, stop the ad. It's racist. No, it's not. You can't get there from here anymore. Or as I like to say, that dog don't hunt. I'm sorry, that dog don't hunt. You know what? Let's listen to some of the haters and their problems with this ad. Sidney Sweeney has good genes. Really? Like, the eugenics in that. It's dripping with it. And I'm like, no. I think it's just showing what kind of country we're turning into.

It's white supremacy at the end of the day. That's what this ad is representing. Yeah, that's not a good look. Yeah, I mean, she's blonde hair, blue-eyed, white woman, you know, very cute. And a lot of the things she's been doing online have been a little bit questionable. It seems that she's definitely been, you know, pandering to a certain group of men online. I definitely think if it were a black woman, it would send a different message, specifically because that's the world that we've created, that we've grown up in.

And so by specifically using a white person, it completely disregards everything that we've spent the last centuries working towards. And so that just kind of, it just, it rubs us the wrong way. Who are the biggest, the biggest ad generate? What stars out there? What celebrities are the ones that move the needle the most in terms of, of promotion like this? It's the Williams sisters. It's Michael Jordan. It's LeBron James.

It's Tiger Woods. It's Oprah Winfrey. If you want to sell a product, you get them to sell your product. you get them to sell your product. Anybody who tells you that we don't live in a world where the idea of a black person representing a brand doesn't have mass appeal

is a friggin idiot or a liar or too stupid to exist. Like you're telling me that you don't remember the impact of Michael Jordan on shoe sales on Coca-Cola, on McDonald's. You don't remember Oprah Winfrey being able to sell any book she wants just by saying it. You don't remember the Williams sisters and everything they've been able to do?

You don't remember Tiger Woods making golf appealing, the most boring sport in the world, appealing to everyone? Get off your high horse and come back and live in a world where things actually make sense. This is a girl selling jeans. That's all it is. And if you're going to call it Nazism, let's actually do real Nazis. Because there are real Nazis out there, and they are chanting death to the Jews. And they are standing next to you at those protests. You friggin' hypocrite.

It's exhausting living in this world. Absolutely exhausting. And by the way, God love American Eagle because they put a massive, huge billboard in Times Square. And this was them saying, yeah, sorry, you're wrong. We're going to double down. We're going to sell even more of these genes and good for them. And look, Sidney Sweeney is, apparently she's a registered Republican, which fits perfectly into these people's world view as if being a Republican, by definition, makes you a bad person. It does not.

Just like being a Democrat doesn't make you a good person. there are good people and bad people everywhere and it's who you are not the party you're affiliated with but Donald Trump does like that she's a Republican here's what he had to say she's a very hot actresses she's a registered Republican

oh now I love her ad is that right you'd be surprised at how many people are Republicans that's what I wouldn't have known but I'm glad you told me that if Sidney is a registered Republican I think her ad is fantastic

okay thank you very much everybody she's a registered Republican but from what I understand she didn't vote in the last election that's how important politics clearly is to her you know she probably registered because and she just didn't vote because right a lot of people don't vote

she didn't vote but but people are going to definitely ascribe motivation and intention to her because of the party that she is registered for So after the break, we're going to talk about this some more because this is an issue, right? It's not the issue that the left wants to make it. It's not the issue that the social justice warriors want to make it. They are the issue.

And we'll talk about that next with your call. So give us a call here at the Ben Mulroney show. Don't go anywhere. We'll be back right after this. Welcome back. to the Ben Mulroney show. We're talking about the Sydney-Sweeney controversy, or rather controversy and name only.

It's as far as I can see trumped up outrage for the sake of outrage. Let's start with Edward. Edward, welcome to the show. Thanks for taking my call. Yes. So, you brought up the Beyonce Gine ad, and I am deeply offended

because she had blonde hair. Is that not cultural appropriation of my culture? Edward I appreciate because I agree there's certain things that are blatantly

hypocritical but but to me on my side of the equation it does not behoove me to do a tit for tat because I'm trying to expose

the flaws on one side so that we don't have to do it on the other but I can see that what I would say is Beyoncé say is a hugely influential marketing machine. And she has been the face of countless products.

Why Sidney Sweeney cannot be the face of a product without being accused of the most terrible, atrocious things in the world is beyond me. But thank you very much for the call. Let's take Jeff. Jeff, you've got your own insights on this. Tell me about them. Yeah, you know, I am disappointed sometimes at the feeling indignance of some people about certain things. Now, I think the outrage is not about the person in the ad.

The outrage is about the insinuation that somebody ought to hear, genes is better. And not genes with a G, but genes with a G. And I think that that's what people are latching on to the insinuation of some or the other. Her genes is better. And it says that, you know, I remember. Well, Jeff, Jeff, let me, let's make this a conversation. I could argue that if you take a look at her, she's got great jeans. I mean, she's got great jeans.

Yes, but it doesn't mean that her great jeans is better than others. well hold on hold on she is she is an exceptionally beautiful girl and and she is being put in an ad

which is visual first and she is yes she's trading on her sexuality and we live in a world where not only is that not a bad thing but we celebrate it in a lot of cases so I don't mind live in a world where she's got

because the goal is to be aspirational people I'll buy it If I buy those jeans, maybe my jeans are better. But, again, Jeff, don't you, like, I know that you told my producer that there are very real issues that affect the black community. I find that a silly conversation like this, I find the outrage, the situational hypocrisy. I find it, it wastes time. And rather than address, like, rather than just say, you know what, that's an ad, I may like it, I may not, let's move on.

and so that we can address real issues that I know are important to you. We're focused on something stupid like this. I also told you, producer, that I really don't pay much attention to the nuances of racism. I do well in what I do, and I love what I do,

I'm the best of what I do, and I don't give a doubt about any other people. Good for you. But you cannot ignore these little micro, for the better word, aggressions that come out in these ads. Sometimes I remember Kid Rock shooting at beer cans because there was a transgender person advertised on the beer cans. And I found that to be outrageous, but it was the talk

at the time about the ad and about a transgender person on the ad. He was shooting at beer cans. So we cannot pretend that someone or the other, when black people are upset about something they perceive to be a flight is wrong, but when white people do it. I'm a judge. Jeff, I'm going to say I find it self-indulgent. I mean, listen, we're living in a world where I open my phone and white people are getting knocked cold out in Cincinnati by black folk. And I look at that as an issue that needs to be dealt with by the cops. I'm not looking at it like something bigger than that.

It's like we have problems that we need to address. Yes. I open my phone, Ben. Yeah. I open my phone and I see top. killing on armed or brutalizing on our black people. And yes, Jeff. We see things

and those are important issues to deal with. Sydney Sweeney takes our eye off the ball. These algorithms then are giving us stuff that is creating this division. Yes. But by the way, but this this nonsense

is self-inflicted division. This is a, this is an ad for genes. Just like any other ad is an ad for whatever. This is an ad for genes. We are, we have decided we're this is a line in the sand for some people. And Jeff, just like, think about it for a second.

She is being, the ad is being called Nazi. I mean, can you you, ah, you want to take issue with the ad? Fine. But that is, that is turning it up to 11, the point that I'm... There's a reason people are upset about it because it's this two genes

that are talking about. No, no, no. Jeff, we are living in a time where there is a group of people who, if they aren't outraged, have nothing to do. We have, we have given license to a certain type of person to be outraged over anything they so choose and they can make up whatever reason they want. You, sir, are a smart man who has, who has, I know, because we've talked before, you are passionate, you have values, you know what's important, you know this isn't important, you know this is dumb. It's not, but Ben, it's happening on both sides, and I'm telling you, these,

algorithms that these social media companies are using is what exacerbating. I, Sally, you and I are going to agree on that every second of the day. I'm going to let you go there, Jeff. Call back anytime I love talking to you. Who do we have next? We've got Irene. Irene, welcome. Good morning, Ben.

How are you today? I'm well. Calm down. Calm down now. I'm fine. Talk to as a female here. Oh, my God. I'm so proud of her.

You have no idea. All power. laughing to the bank. Yeah. She is. And do you remember Covent Klein? Yeah. I mean, look at that.

Talk about in those days, that was really ranchy of that commercial. Yep. These are women are smart. Yeah. It's all about, it's all about the marking of the genes. It's just, they're losing focus. They're totally losing focus. I'm proud of her.

Yeah. As a female, go, girl, go. A thousand, but thank you very much, Irene. Go, girl, go. I say that about you as well. Let's welcome Rob into the conversation. Rob. Hey, Ben.

How are you? I'm awesome, man. I'm back from a road, work, road trip. So, catching up with you guys on 640. Fantastic. You know, I love these Sydney Sweeney ads. I think they're very tasteful. But, you know, the perpetually offended are always going to be,

so they're becoming more and more unhinged, right? Oh, yeah. So here's a beautiful white woman with blonde hair and blue eyes in tasteful clothing, promoting a product that's made in America, and it fits her well. It's not revealing in any way. I mean, I don't know why the left women, the liberal women in the states are upset about this. I mean, there's plenty of room in the crotch of those pants for their testicles. Oh, geez.

Okay. Well, Rob, thank you very much. I'm going to leave you right there. Look, the fact that I'm hearing, people say, oh, it's not inclusive. Okay, well, then how come, like, no, that's unacceptable. If you believe, as I do, that you can't be what you can't see, which is why we have more representation in media now than we have in years past, and there are people from various cultural communities, assuming various public-facing positions in all sorts of media, and that is a good thing, if you believe that that's important, then you also have to recognize that there are a whole bunch of white people out there who deserve to be seen in media. Like, it just is if it's important for the South Asian community to be represented and the black community and the gay community and the deaf community and the this community and then you have to recognize that it is also important for you to be able to communicate with and advertise to white people. Call me crazy.

But it just, I mean, is that a hot take? I'm sure with some people it is. Are you saying that for that ad to be acceptable? Sidney Sweeney needed to be shoulder to shoulder with the United Colors of Benetton? Because that's crazy. That's crazy and it's insulting. And it falls apart under the weight of its own hypocrisy. And I'm not stupid and neither are you. And I don't want to talk to you

like you're stupid. And I don't like these people coming up with problematic issues that only work if I'm an idiot. And I'm not an idiot. And that's all I will say about that. In the 70s, four young women were found dead. For nearly 50 years, their cases went cold. I'm Nancy Hixed, a senior crime reporter for global news. In the season finale of Crime Beat, I share how investigators uncovered shocking evidence of a serial killer. And hear exclusive interviews with the killer's family.

Listen to the full season of Crime Beat early and ad-free on Amazon music by asking Alexa to play the podcast Crime Beat. Welcome back to the show. Thanks so much for spending a little bit of your Tuesday with us. I don't know if you guys know. I've said it before, but some of you may not know that I hold the title of the very first Uber Rider in the entire country. I am Rider Zero. You didn't know that, did you? Yeah, I'm Rider Zero.

Very excited to take Uber in Toronto. I thought it was the disruption that the cab industry needed. And then after a few years, Uber became sort of the bad guy. And then I hoped when Lyft came into Toronto, that that would be the choice that riders needed in this city to keep Uber's bad instincts in check. That has not come to pass. now there are two new rideshare companies in Toronto that are hoping to make a mark and expand beyond the city of Toronto across the country and indeed maybe take on Uber all over the world. And so to discuss this and much more, we're joined by a good friend of the show,

Tony Chapman. Tony, welcome. Always a pleasure, my friend. Now, just for everybody's knowledge and an effort of full disclosure, I am an advisor to the company Hover. So that's one of the two companies. we're going to be talking about right now. You know, and it's interesting that, first of all, let's unpack what Uber did really well. They looked at an unmet need. The first unmet need was people were tired of getting out in a pouring rainstorm and trying to flag down a taxi and hoping somebody would take mercy on them.

Getting in a stranger's car, handing over cash, everything about the whole taxi industry needed to be revamped. The taxi industry should have, but very often legacy doesn't like to interrupt, status quo. So Uber came along and basically you could summon your Trojan. It was a rating and ranking system and it was very affordable compared to taxis. So they absolutely were first mover advantage and I still would maintain that it's going to be very difficult to dismantle what they created in the consumer's minds. There was the alternative to taxis. So as these new companies are getting involved, my question to them would be what unmet needs are you now solving that Uber

has not addressed. Well, if I, so I can't speak about the other, there's two companies. There's hover and another one, and you can tell me about that one because I don't know anything about it. But to answer your question as, and I'm not speaking on behalf of the company, I'm speaking as an advisor to the company, I would say that the need that they are meeting is the need to pay the drivers a fair wage. And the business model allows for that in a way that Uber cannot.

Yeah. So this is an excellent point. So will they get better talent? Will that talent be able to afford better cars? Will the consumer be willing to pay the increased price attached to it? And that's really how marketing unfolds. The business model allows for lower, actually lower cost rides eventually at scale. At scale, they will be able to offer less expensive rides. It's a completely different business model. It's a membership model that makes the drivers pay a flat monthly membership fee to be on the platform. And once they're on the platform, the driver keeps 100% of the fare, 100% of the tip minus $1.00 that goes towards paying municipal regulations. And the money is made by the company by that membership fee as well as a few

other revenue streams. So it's a brilliant model on paper. Then the question I would ask if I was advising, and I know you've asked these questions, is how do we get to scale? How do we create enough demand out there that that subscription is money well spent? Correct. And that's how they'll measure it. So if I'm paying $10 a month as a subscription fee and I'm getting $20 in profit, wow, that's good business. And that's really what we deal with in this whole new economy, whether it's AI or dot com,

is the ability to break through, attention is your oxygen. The only way you're going to get anybody to sign up is they pay attention to your thing and going, do I need this better mousetrap? Is this something as a consumer that I'm looking? looking for. And I think Lyft is struggle to dismantle Uber. Where Uber's faulted, obviously, is with the regulations within the cities. So it'll be interesting to see it play out because I'm a big fan of disruption. I'm a big fan of David versus Goliath. I like the slingshot they're playing. The question will come to, can they afford the marketing that's required to get enough consumers

taking their service that the drivers out there saying, this is the subscription platform I'm looking for to retain more of the income for me? Absolutely. Hey, let's talk about about Doritos because I remember I was listening to a podcast where they said that Taco Bell as a company, when they advertise, they never advertise like the quality of the food. The ads have very little to do with the food you're going to eat. It's about the, it's about the, it's about the brand, right? And it feels like with this new Doritos commercial, they're, they're taking a page out of that book. They're trying to create a feeling around their brand, less so about like what the chip actually is.

You know, it's a great, great storyline on this one. I've worked on the Doritos brand for over two decades. And it's very much lifestyle, youth, again, very much the disrupt the status quo, which youth like to do, the rebellious. So you can understand why they're doing it. But you're also when you talked about Taco Bell, it's really, it's called a sales funnel. So the top of the funnel, you do all sorts of this brand initiatives, just have people think about Taco Bell.

The bottom of the sales funnel, you'll put your incentives and offers and price points. you know, three tacos for $4 Wednesdays. And in the middle, you talk about your product. And you're right, Taco Bell very rarely talks about the product or their ingredients, probably because that's not their strong suit. What I like about what Doritos is doing is they're really trying to dial up spice as their pointed distinction. And rather than just talking about yet another flavor profile, they went to what they thought

was a very spicy genre, which is, you know, pornography, and had a play on it in terms of making this sort of a naughty kind of campaign. And I think it's a very clever way, especially with the males they're targeting, who spend a lot of time looking at porn that using this is a way to create an itch. And again, go back to the oxygen of marketing attention. It's an attention grabbing. And when you do it, you go, hey, that's kind of fun. Oh, you know what?

I'd like to try those Doritos next time I'm out and about. So kudos to the Doritos corn chip that they've turned into this sort of iconic brand because of stunts like this. Yeah. All right, let's talk about this decision with coming down in the United States

that the U.S. may require a $15,000 bond to enter the country. So a visa applicants would have to post a bond of up to 15K if they want that visa and if they want to come

into the United States. Talk to me about the reasoning behind this and what the knock-on effects might be. Let's break it down to cause and effect. The cause of this, obviously, these people come in for a short-term visa and the slip under the radar and then become working in America under the table.

So Trump's easy answer is, well, we'll put a $15,000 bond. And if you don't leave the country, when you're supposed to, you're going to forfeit that bond. And obviously, the more people to do it, the higher, more expensive that bond will be. The impact on tourism, the impact is, I would say 98%, I'm just making up this number, but the vast, fast majority of people coming in on a visa are doing so within a timeline that they're going to respect to. leave. Yeah. So you're, you're, you're being punitive to the vast majority to try to catch the minority. And what you're also going to do is from a tourism point of view, put another stain on the brand that people around the world going, is it really worth going to the United

States? Yeah. Is it really worth it? Is this, is this, the, the line, it's like trying to kill a fly with the bazooka? Yeah, exactly what it is. But isn't that Trump's style, right? It makes Trump, Trump just sees a problem, comes to an immediate answer, and just, and impresses tweet and put it out in his true social without having anybody literally in this kind of case you'd need an army of really smart people to break it down and say what will be the lasting impact on economy is this a good decision or a bad one versus trigger happy trump that says oh i see i see a target let's let's fire that bazooka and i think this is just a ridiculous demonstration of how united states has gone from kind of this this country that we dream of and do and all the i

iconic imagery that Hollywood is presented of America for decades and literally getting dismantled on Trump's watch. But lastly, one of the knock-on effects could be a piece on university campuses. I mean, if university students, when they get their student visas, have to put this $15,000 bond down and if all of a sudden they're caught burning flags and occupying buildings and breaking laws, well, they could see themselves sent home minus the 15K. Yeah. And then the question is, are universities who are desperate for foreign students going to underwrite the cost of the bond. Yeah. And so again, it just has a ripple effect, but cause

and effect, if only our government and the government in the United States really understood it versus just this sense of very reactive kind of politics that we're saying. And I think that we're just losing that sense of strategy, that three-dimensional test boards. And I think we need we need more of that back in our democracy. Thank you, Tony Chapman. Always a pleasure. Thank you. Did you know your brain releases the exact same mix of chemicals during orgasm as when you spot a UFO or break your leg? I'm David Cooper, and on the last show, curiosity is king, and discovering the science behind what makes us all tick is what we're all about.

It's where science, sex, and comedy hookup. So prepare to have your mind blown the last show with David Cooper. Subscribe and follow on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your favorite podcasts.