Sydney Sweeney‘s viral American Eagle campaign is being accused of blatantly leaning into Nazi propaganda.
The 27-year-old‘s latest campaign is to promote the denim line for the clothing brand American Eagle Outfitters. On Wednesday, the brand released a series of pictures and cheeky clips of the Euphoria star wearing head-to-toe blue denim with the tagline “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans”.
In one of the ads, the Anyone but You star can be seen putting up a billboard which reads: “Sydney Sweeney has great genes”. However, the word genes is crossed out, with the word “jeans” scrawled underneath it.
In another short for the campaign, Sweeney is shown lying down, buttoning up her jeans while she’s heard saying, “genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair colour, personality and even eye colour”.
As the camera pans up to her face, she says, “My jeans are blue” before a male voice-over says the tagline: “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans”.
Why is this campaign sparking backlash?
Following its launch on Wednesday, the campaign quickly drew mixed responses from viewers from the moment it began circulating.
Some people took it as an obvious tongue-in-cheek reference to Sweeney’s obvious good looks. Others, however, have pointed out that referencing the “good genes” of the blonde-haired, blue-eyed Sweeney is tantamount to a “racialised dog whistle” which “promotes eugenics”.
While having a white, blonde and blue blue-eyed spokesperson doesn’t mean the campaign is propaganda, it does feel a bit icky to have Sweeney — who does check all the aryan boxes — position her physical traits as ideal.
“Yeah, this is just clear eugenicist propaganda. Y’all weren’t kidding at all,” said one X user.
“The American Eagles ad wasn’t just a commercial. It was a love letter to white nationalism and eugenic fantasies, and Sydney Sweeney knew it,” said another.
Meanwhile, some people think that the American Eagle campaign was referencing a 1980 Calvin Klein campaign starring a 15-year-old Brooke Shields — which, for the record, is still pretty off.
In Shields’ 1980 campaign, she was seen posing in jeans and reciting a script which also references a jeans-genes wordplay. These days, the campaign is pretty infamous due to the extreme sexualisation that an underage Shields experienced.
Ultimately, though, the campaign seems to be doing pretty well for American Eagle Outfitters. After Sweeney was announced as the face of the campaign, the stocks went up by 12 per cent. Just one day after the campaign was released, they jumped another four.
According to 9News, the surge added almost $US228 million ($346 million) to its market capitalisation.
What has Sydney Sweeney or American Eagle Outfitters said?
Both Sydney Sweeney and American Eagle Outfitters have yet to comment on the backlash.
Honestly, Sweeney tends to keep quiet in the press, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she stays quiet until this whole thing blows over. As for American Eagle Outfitters, we’ll have to wait and see.
We’ll have to wait and see.
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