The Current - Why female athletes are mad at Sydney Sweeney’s ad

Episode Date: September 15, 2026

Actor Sydney Sweeney is once again facing backlash over an advertisement. Female athletes around the world are responding to a nude sports gambling ad. Culture critic Bee Quamie on why Sweeney is such a lightning rod for controversy and what this ad and response to it can tell us about this moment in women’s sport.

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the road less traveled. After all the awkwardness, disasters, and family drama, Mark Critch, is finally graduating. Maybe it's about not settling for the way things are, but making your own way. No, it's both jobs. And to move forward, he must hold on to what matters most. Don't give up on your dreams. Say goodbye to a Canadian comedy we've grown up with. Son of a Critch, the final season.

Stream now on CBC Jam. This is a CBC podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is the current podcast. Sports, sports, sports, sports, sports, sports. No betting on wars or deaths. That's the ad that put the actor Sidney Sweeney back at the center of controversy. Sidney Sweeney is best known for her role as Cassie in the HBO teen drama euphoria. And now she is appearing in this ad for the sports betting and prediction market Novig

and appearing in a way that has drawn an aviournian. of critics online and beyond. So I just watched Sydney Sweeney's sports ad for the first time, and oh my gosh, I genuinely think that set us back like 200 years. That ad completely delegitimizes women's roles in sport. It goes way back to treating women like their only role within sports is the sex appeal that they can bring to the men who enjoy sport. Sydney Sweeney's ad makes me angry to my core because there are little girls right now that

I am trying to convince. It is okay to be an athlete. It is okay to be strong. And that their value is not placed in what they look like. B. Kwami is a writer and culture critic. B, good morning. Good morning. Tens of millions of people, or at the very least there have been tens of millions of views of this ad.

For people who have not seen it, can you describe this ad that has set people off? Yes. So in extended and shorter versions of the ad for Novig, which is a new sports betting app, We see Sidney Sweeney pretty much nude. I think you can see her wearing some underwear and some shots, but she's got various balls and athletic gear strategically placed over her private parts. And in her best seductive voice, she asked the viewer, you know, if they know sports and to prove it, sharing that, as we heard in the intro, Novics platform doesn't bet on wars,

death or politics, just sports. She repeats the word sports, sports, sports, as we see a montage of her hitting a baseball. posing as a hockey goalie, lying down on a table with a soccer ball at her feet, all pretty much well-nude or, you know, giving the illusion of that. So, you know, riveting stuff, but definitely has started the conversation. When you saw the ad, what was your immediate reaction? Oh, it was an immediate eye roll, first of all. You know, I remember, as many pop culture enthusiasts do, we remember her last controversy with the American Eagle ads from last summer.

So I thought, okay, here we go, utilizing Sidney for another titillating ad that is going to do exactly what it's meant to do, which is draw conversation, whether it's positive or negative. That's exactly what it's doing. But I roll first, and then I just felt really icky about how blatant it was in terms of what I feel that Novig is trying to do with this ad and who they're trying to reach and to bring into utilizing their app. You're not the only one who is feeling the ick. Have a listen to two Canadian Olympians, the rower Jill Moffat, and then figure skater, Madeline Skeezis. Power to her in a way, but then it's like, at what cost? When you think about the context, then, you know,

at what cost is it worth making that monetary gain? I was a little frustrated that it was being used in the context of sports. Why did this have to be how you presented sports in general? Women's role in sports. Like, it's not just, we aren't just spectators. We aren't just there for people to goggle. at us, right? B, how would you describe the response, particularly from women athletes? Yeah, well, clearly we're hearing that women athletes, and these are world-class athletes,

swimmers, boxers, gymnasts, you know, across the spectrum of sports, they're really rightfully critiquing this because of the blatant over-sexualization and that connection between women and sport. And in a time where a lot of conversation, especially recent conversation that we've seen in sport, particularly like with the WNBA, we're seeing conversations around what does femininity mean? What does womanhood mean in sport? We're having these conversations around, sorry, around the idea of trans women in sports. And I feel like not only does this conversation and the reaction to it highlight the over-sexualization that these women athletes are bringing to the table, but it's also bringing a little something deeper into who we consider.

consider the ideal woman in sport is, which is funny because Sidney Sweeney is not known for being an athlete. And this is not the first app to utilize a celebrity to be their spokesperson. However, it's really, really interesting when it comes to women and women athletes and looking at women in sport. To your point, it comes at a time when the WNBA, the PWHL, other soccer leagues, the Northern League here in Canada are exploding in popularity. Exactly. And you have then professional athletes, you have sprinters and sports. swimmers and gymnasts who are posting photos of them, having gone through whatever they've gone through out on the track or in the pool, and they say this is what a woman in sport looks like.

Exactly. And I think that that is a brilliant way to kind of combat this. I mean, we can also look at the statistics around sports betting, gambling, and all those different types of things that happen societally and individually when people are, you know, really engaging in these types of apps, but also with women athletes looking at, like I said, this very blatant over-sexualization, I love that women are showing that it's not what your body looks like. It's what your body is able to do. And women athletes who are bringing in the statistics of young girls, you know, I think it's about 62% of young girls stop playing sports by the age of 16 because of pressure, because of the, you know, insecurities about their bodies. And I love that women

athletes are really showing, hey, we are talking about what your body can do, not just what it looks like. Let's focus on that and bring the conversation back to where it should be. Can we talk about Sidney Swini? I said in the introduction that she's best known for her role in Euphoria. I don't know if that's actually true anymore. I think she's best known for outrage and being part of, she was in this, you mentioned this, this ad for American Eagle. Good Jeans was the campaign. And people said, what do you mean good genes because they were pointing at Sydney's? What is it about her? She seems to be pretty good. at, you know, ginning up attention.

What is it about her that makes her a lightning rod? Yes. Well, you know what? I think it's a really interesting thing to combine, you know, as her being known for euphoria and knowing that that show has been kind of a lightning rod for other discussions around the portrayal of teens and drugs and sex, all of that, right? And we see Sidney in her, the role that she played in that and how she was kind of of amplified on the, you know, on the Hollywood stage because of that role, but how that has

translated and how she's been used in these ads. And there's a really interesting connection, I think, between the controversy of the American Eagle ad and this idea of good genes and what we're seeing Novig doing, utilizing her in this ad. And I just want to caveat to say she's not just a spokesperson for Novig. He's also a strategic partner and an equity holder. So she's got a very different vested interest in what's happening with Novig right now on just that level. But this, this portrayal of a young, white, blonde-haired, blue-eyed, conventionally attractive woman, first being highlighted for quote-unquote her good genes, now being utilized as a model of what it looks like to be a woman engaged in sports, even in the most kind of loose way, because again, she's not an athlete.

she's really known for this, especially when you have interviews with her and she, you know, varies between, you know, MAGA adjacent with her politics or being very blatantly apolitical. So there's a lot that people are putting on her based on what she's giving and not giving us in her own words and her own image. You mentioned that she has equity in this company that she's advertising. Let me play you something else. This is from the content creator, Paige Lipinski. You're selling a sports company with a beautiful, basically naked woman. So I understand why that feels like going backwards.

But I also understand why men love it. It's sports and a woman they find incredibly attractive. The ad is provocative on purpose. It knows exactly who it's getting attention from. And Sidney-Sweeney herself chose to do it. She's actually an investor in the company. So you could also argue why, can't a woman use her sexuality own it and profit from it if she wants to? Why can't she be?

You know, I think it goes back to one of the clips that we heard earlier where the athlete or influencer I can't remember said, at what cost? At what cost? When we talk about feminism and talk about solely the idea of choice feminism, which is kind of aligning with what we just heard. That is part of it, but again, we have to ask at what cost? What does this individual decision do to the larger group? Does it help? Does it harm? Does it only help? If it only helps Sidney-Sweeney, what is that really doing in terms of amplifying equity and equality and things of that nature for the whole. I'm not sure if it's going to achieve anything for the whole. So again, I would say to that, sure, but at what cost. So that's kind of where I land on that.

You know, just finally, you know who it helps is, is the company that is being advertised here, that people perhaps have never heard of before and now everybody's talking about it. But at a time when outrage sells, right? And so I guess we're out of time, but just very briefly, do you think, is all attention, good attention in that outrage economy? In outrage economy, exactly. That is the currency that is most important, the attention, the outrage currency, that is what is most important. And it's showing, it's showing, because I know that the key demographic in sports betting is largely male, especially in Canadian data, shows around 71% of people who engage are men. So obviously, they're going to attract who they want to attract, but then

you've got people like me who would never touch a sports betting app with a 10-foot pole, and I'm spending my morning chatting about Novick. So it's doing what it's supposed to do. Be good to talk to you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Have a great day. And you, B Kwame, is a culture critic based in Toronto. This has been the current podcast. You can hear our show Monday to Friday on CBC Radio 1 at 8.30am at all time zones.

You can also listen online at cbc.ca.ca slash the current or on the CBC Listen app or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. For more CBC podcasts, go to cBC.ca.ca slash podcasts.