[Ed. Note: For a refresher course, you can watch every Super Bowl ad right here.]

Before I get started on my review of this year’s Super Bowl commercials I want to come to the aid of a lady in distress. Can we lay off of Christina Aguilera and her muffed line in the National Anthem? Look, she was nervous, under pressure, and out of her element. The NFL asked her to sing fully clothed and without a stripper pole to hang onto. While I’m on the subject of the Nation Anthem why can’t the football players show a little respect when the country is being honored? Their sideline slouching was shameful! Roger Goodell, get out your paddle and take some of those guys to the woodshed.

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Once again, the folks who thought Super Bowl 45  was a good way to spend their investors dollars, spent slightly more than the gross national product of Niger and Ethiopia combined with, in most cases, very mediocre results. With so many ads it’s hard in a short piece to hit them all so I am skipping all the promos and movie trailers although the Fox/House parody of the 1980 Mean Joe Green was one of my favorites.

I think I have finally figured out that GoDaddy.com is run by a horny fifteen year old boy out of his parents’ basement. What in the world does trying to make me think Joan Rivers is hot have to do with getting a domain name? Joan is a safe distance from “hot” no matter how many body doubles they used. I don’t know how much money Danica Patrick and Jillian Michaels are paid to debase themselves in what year after years have been the unsexiest and unfunniest ads, but it isn’t nearly enough. The ads beg us to go to their website to see the “uncensored” endings to the ads. I wonder how many frustrated high school boys went to GoDaddy thinking they were going to see Ms. Patrick and Ms. Michaels in the buff but only found a lame joke/dance number instead. Can someone tell me who GoDaddy’s biggest competitor are because I am moving my domain name.

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Not being a fan, I don’t normally watch a lot of football or even Super Bowl games. But my wife has been a Packer fanatic her entire life, we were invited to a party, and as I watched the pre-game today I was simply blown away (and moved) by how passionately the NFL puts its love for America and our troops out there for the entire world to see.

Hey, maybe that’s why the Super Bowl embarrasses the Academy Awards in the ratings year after year?

But when it was Hollywood’s turn to turn on the patriotism, one of their biggest stars couldn’t even remember the words to her own National Anthem. And obviously she hadn’t rehearsed enough to pretend she did.

Normally, I’m pretty forgiving of this kind of flub, but the symbolism here is simply too rich to ignore. (more…)

“Feminism is a Crock – and Other True Stories.” That’s the title for a book I’d like to write someday. The reason I say feminism is a crock is because it has morphed from “equal rights for all” to “women are better than men, and if you disagree you’re a sexist pig who should be castrated.” It’s also morphed into a sexual free-for-all: what used to be sauce for the gander (and those ganders were usually considered cads) is now sauce for the goose. This image is being perpetuated by pop culture and entertainment, and women are more and more frequently being portrayed as strong through their sexuality, not through their actual accomplishments. Is this the standard to which we want our daughters to aspire?

Early feminists fought against the centuries-old image of a “woman on a pedestal.” Gloria Steinem (she of the “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle” who in later years ended up getting married anyway) once said, “A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space.” I suppose a bra is also a small, confined space, which might explain the bra burnings of the 1960s. But the early feminists had a point – to a point. If a woman wants to be put on a pedestal and admired and adored, fine. But if she doesn’t, she should have the right to do with her life as she chooses. She should be free to pursue any vocation for which she is qualified, either as a single or married woman, children or no children.

But one of the problems with the new feminism was the annoying little fact that children could get in the way of this brave new world. Having to either stay at home with the little tykes or find daycare for them – not to mention all of the discomfort and disfiguration that comes with pregnancy itself – sure put a damper on Gloria Steinem’s idea of a “liberated woman” being “one who has sex before marriage and a job after.” Unbridled sex does, after all, have consequences. And so, according to historian Elaine Tyler May, birth control was “an important tool to gain control over their lives.” (more…)

Have you seen the new music videos by Miley Cyrus and Christina Aguilera? If you haven’t, let me save you nine minutes of precious time. Both videos feature the young, attractive, talented singers clad in lingerie dancing, gyrating and engaging in simulated sex acts with both men and women.

In a word, boring.

Rather than hit these two from the completely legitimate position of criticizing their moral bankruptcy (especially in the case of the the underage Cyrus), let’s have some fun and hit them from the other side. That’s right, let’s talk about “art” and “feminism”.

Sure ladies, your new videos are “edgy,” “stylish,” “provocative,” “liberating” and “artistic”….for 1985. Fact is, we’ve seen this all before. The crazy wardrobe, stylized lighting, racy sexuality, blah, blah, blah. Madonna was doing this stuff 25 years ago. I have to laugh when people point out the obvious comparisons between the new Xtina video and Lady Gaga’s recent video achievements. Both of them are simply poor imitations for the “Grandmother of Smut” herself. Taking Xtina to task for ripping off Lady Gaga is like criticizing a Tarantino parrot without acknowledging the wealth of films that QT has paid “homage” to himself. (more…)

The recent fracas at the American Music Awards is yet another reason why I am glad I don’t go in for the mutual admiration society gatherings known as awards shows.

American Idol runner up Adam Lambert, one of the performers during the live East Coast broadcast, shocked viewers with his “pelvic-thrust[ing] … four-minute, S&M-themed routine, taking time out from singing to grope a female dancer, kiss a male musician and, most shockingly, shove a male dancer’s face into his crotch, in an act that simulated fellatio.”

Nothing like watching a little simulated fellatio to round out an evening with the family. Pass the popcorn!

Sources from the AMA claimed that those dance moves had not been part of the rehearsal, and the West Coast version of the show was edited to delete the scene. Now there’s the real scandal: trying to protect children who might be watching. If it’s good enough for the likes of the celebs in the AMA audience, it should be good enough for your 10 year old. (more…)

The disconnect between beauty and popularity in music has never been greater.  Where once America sang the Beatles or Motown (“The Sound of Young America”), today the music industry is severely fragmented.  Gangsta rap.  Speed metal.  Trip-hop.  The major recording companies whine about declining profits even as they pay Mariah Carey $18 million not to record.

Unanimity of public opinion over popular song has passed.  Music, which used to unite, now divides.  Eminem and Ludacris would have been unthinkable thirty years ago.  We live in an antinomian age where it’s hip to defy conventional wisdom long after every vestige of conventional wisdom lies in tatters.  Where Keats’ Grecian Urn once proclaimed, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” today’s antinomian consumer proclaims, “Whatever,” in a voice oozing ennui. (more…)