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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   27776 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 27, 2023

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For a few reasons, I’ve found myself consuming more ad-supported video lately, both traditional broadcast-style television and ad-supported streaming. I work in an advertising-adjacent industry, so I try to look at the commercials with a more critical eye. And there’s one advertising trend that I can’t seem to escape:

White men don’t exist.

This is not to say that white men are somewhat underrepresented, that despite being 31% of the US population, they’re only 15% of those being cast in ads, or something along those lines. This is to say that there are literally no white men in TV commercials. You can watch ad-supported TV for hours and not see a single one. For a while I noticed that white men were allowed to be shown, but only if there was a non-white, non-male onscreen with them. But more recently the trend has been to simply not show them at all.

I’d love for someone to try and replicate this - watch TV for 2-3 hours and count how many seconds of ad time a white male is onscreen, and if he’s shown by himself or not.

There are a few exceptions to this rule, of course: white male celebrities can be onscreen by themselves; no one has a problem with Tom Brady or Jon Travolta. And in that same vein, an ad for a particular movie or TV show will obviously show clips from the show or movie, where the rules for ads don’t apply.

This leads me to one of two conclusions:

  1. Representation doesn’t really matter. “Representation Matters” is something we hear quite often, but the revealed preference of advertisers for not casting white men in their ads shows they know it to be untrue. While they’re happy to parrot “Representation Matters,” they have all the actual data at their fingertips. White men buy trucks and big macs and technology, so if representation actually mattered, advertisers would include them in their ads.

  2. Representation does matter, but those making the decisions are so ideologically committed that they’re willing to hurt their own bottom line in order to “do the right thing.” They’re so committed to their ideals that they’re willing to depress their own effectiveness by more than 30%. And they do so with no guarantee that their rival agency is going to follow the same set of rules, potentially putting them out of business.

Applying this realization to the broader culture war, I’ve often been skeptical of the idea of a distributed conspiracy. Large conspiracies like faking the moon landing would require so many people to be in on it as to be impossible to maintain. So concepts like “The Cathedral” or “The Deep State” have always elicited some amount of skepticism from me.

And yet, here we have a distributed conspiracy in action! Thousands of ad agencies, absent a clear directive or government regulation, have all landed on the exact rule, and one that would on its face appear to be very limiting.

This leads me to one of two conclusions:

  1. Representation doesn’t really matter. “Representation Matters” is something we hear quite often, but the revealed preference of advertisers for not casting white men in their ads shows they know it to be untrue. While they’re happy to parrot “Representation Matters,” they have all the actual data at their fingertips. White men buy trucks and big macs and technology, so if representation actually mattered, advertisers would include them in their ads.
  2. Representation does matter, but those making the decisions are so ideologically committed that they’re willing to hurt their own bottom line in order to “do the right thing.” They’re so committed to their ideals that they’re willing to depress their own effectiveness by more than 30%. And they do so with no guarantee that their rival agency is going to follow the same set of rules, potentially putting them out of business.

This assumes different groups are the same. White men have consistently demonstrated a willingness to put themselves in others’ shoes, to respect their interests and to make concessions to their weaknesses. They tend to dismiss kinship as a basis for solidarity outside of the immediate family, and if they are offended, it is often on behalf of Republicans, Christians or some other universalist identity and not Whites. They are certainly aware of the fact that women want and need to be coddled in a way men would find insulting towards themselves. They are not going to lose sleep over commercials pandering to the fairer sex.

It is simply very hard for White men to see themselves as victims and vice versa. The fact that this division survived the reevaluation of all values it strong evidence of its validity. There are dominant, hyperagent identities confident in their own strength and whimsical, narcissistic ones that derive power from victimhood. ‘Equality’ is a polite fiction that is neither possible nor appealing to any large group of people.

I've been obliged to watch a lot of corporate training videos lately, and so far there's been an unbroken string of white people and especially white men representing negative examples while their exotic associates and of course especially exotic women represent the correct way of doing things.

I think in all those hours of material I watched, the only white man presented without a negative angle was a presenter.

Anecdote, anecdote, feel free to ignore.

White men don’t exist.

Almost true, but not exactly. My bank, for example, has a landing page where they show the usual stock pictures of happy people, presumably after using their bank services. I haven't seen a white male for a while there. But recently there were - not just one, but two. And a kid between them. If you get my drift. So there are situations where white men exist. Still waiting for a situation where white heterosexual men exist...

those making the decisions are so ideologically committed that they’re willing to hurt their own bottom line in order to “do the right thing.”

I think this is an experimentally established fact? I mean, Bud Light, Victoria Secret, Disney?

they do so with no guarantee that their rival agency is going to follow the same set of rules,

Here I think they have pretty good guarantee. First of all, they are all product of the same indoctrination system. Second of all, if somebody steps out of the line, online mobs - and in the case of especially stubborn target, actual mobs with actual weapons - will take care of them pretty quickly.

It's not a conspiracy - at least no more than things like money or English or Christianity are conspiracies. It's all in the open.

Part of me is concerned that by even replying to you I'm going to be feeding the troll, but other users have already touched upon this, and I feel Like someone needs to just come out and say it.

"Representation" as you are framing it here is frankly stupid. Advertisers by contrast are not stupid. Grifters and Parasites maybe, but not stupid. And they are often quite candid about their methods. It's no secret that if you want to attract the attention of straight white guys you don't use images of straight white guys. You use images of hot chicks, fast cars, sweeping vistas, and the fucking moon landings. Afterall, that is what we all want isn't it?

Sure, I feel a vague annoyance when the BBC goes and portrays medieval London as just as "diverse" as modern London but then I feel annoyed when King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (who allegedly lived in the 7th or 8th century) are portrayed as wearing over-polished 16th century jousting armor and kind of resent the fact that the filmmakers changed the antagonist ship in Master and Commander from American to French. Thing is that I also recognize that I'm the outlier for caring about this shit. Everyone else's attitude could be summed up by saying; London is London, Knights in shining armor are Knights in shining armor, and who cares who exactly is eating grapeshot so long as Britania rules the waves?

I think the question that you, the person posting under the pseudonym @I_like_big_mottes, ought to be asking is "why do you care so much?" Why is your (and apparently so many other's) sense of self and feelings of validation so wrapped up in being represented on screen. That strikes me as the far more interesting question.

Sure, I feel a vague annoyance when the BBC goes and portrays medieval London as just as "diverse" as modern London but then I feel annoyed when King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (who allegedly lived in the 7th or 8th century) are portrayed as wearing over-polished 16th century jousting armor and kind of resent the fact that the filmmakers changed the antagonist ship in Master and Commander from American to French. Thing is that I also recognize that I'm the outlier for caring about this shit. Everyone else's attitude could be summed up by saying; London is London, Knights in shining armor are Knights in shining armor, and who cares who exactly is eating grapeshot so long as Britania rules the waves?

Britania rules the waves? Where?

This paragraph made me imagine a version of 1984 written by Hlynka.

In 1984, the Hlynka version of Winston decides that who cares if the party falsifies history, and ignores it. He doesn't love Big Brother but doesn't care to oppose him. More than merely ignoring it, he even spends time opposing those who suspiciously care too much. It seems suspicious when Oceania rules the waves and there is in fact the threat of Eastasia that people waste time about some falsification of history here and there.

Seems to me that Winston might try to hide it, but he likes Big Brother after all. Maybe this is the version of 1984 that Hillary Clinton read: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/sep/14/hillary-clinton-lesson-1984-trust-leaders-press/

Britania rules the waves? Where?

You mean when, and the answer is "for about 300 years from the late 17th century through to early-mid 20th" and for this reason they also rule the waves in pop culture. The Pirates of the Caribbean don't live in fear of the Spanish, French, or USA, they live in fear of the British Empire and more specifically the Royal Navy.

In 1984, the Hlynka version of Winston decides that who cares if the party falsifies history, and ignores it...

Au contraire, the HlynkaCG version of 1984 is basically just Office Space. Rather than being horrified by the proles' lack of concern for political/corporate matters Winston/Peter embraces it, abandons any pretense of being a good-little party member/employee, finds himself a cuddly wife, and lives a vastly happier life for it.

Edit: formatting

You use images of hot chicks, fast cars, sweeping vistas, and the fucking moon landings

Nope. You talk about one specific set of ads. But there are many more contexts than that. You do advertise luxury cars with hot chicks. But not cheap used family vans. Not mortgage brokers and realtor services. If you want to sell somebody a dream of laying hot chicks - you use hot chicks. If you want to sell somebody a dream of a happy family in a comfortable van and a cheap, but surprisingly decent looking McMansion - hot chicks won't help you there. Happy family pictures would however.

"why do you care so much?"

I can answer that (no, I am not under that pseudonym, I am completely different person) - because I am told everywhere all the time that I should. Every company has an equity statement, keeps racial statistics, and brags about representation. Did you try to apply for a job lately? Literally every single company would ask you for racial data (they say it wouldn't be used in hiring process, but I wonder why ask then?). Every sizable company constantly brags about these things, and pays people to deal with them and then promote their actions in public. I'd be super-happy to go to my happy pre-woke world where I could just ignore it, where I did, but it's kinda hard when you are surrounded by messages that claim that's extremely important 24/7. You start noticing things.

Why is your (and apparently so many other's) sense of self and feelings of validation so wrapped up in being represented on screen.

It's not. But I still notice things. It's a blessing and a curse.

I think the question that you, the person posting under the pseudonym @I_like_big_mottes, need to ask is why do you care so much? Why is your sense of self and feelings of validation so wrapped up in seeing yourself on screen. That strikes me as the far more interesting question.

Not the user but I can surmise that perhaps they fell under the very spell that that media is trying to sell: "Representation matters". That is the message that a certain number of these companies are paying to air, in apparently considerably bigger numbers than in 1990 or 1950.

It could be argued that the poster has in a sense gotten their own mind warped up, transmogrified, 'diversified', n-wordified, so to speak. Indeed, one could believe that white people ought to only care for high-culture such as fine literature, the sciences, academic discussion and such, not whatever garbage comes out of advertisement-streaming devices.

Therefore if one such white person were to incidentally encounter one such advertisement by pure mistake, they would not in anyway be influenced, as such allegedly trite display of propaganda would only alter the psyche of an allegedly lower type of viewer.

No white person of considerable value would ever get their sense of self and feeling of validation wrapped up in what appears on a screen. I would additionally surmise that such a fine user of the screen-mediated themotter.org as @HlynkaCG would never behave in such a manner.

In conclusion, it appears to me that when Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines starts broadcasting that white people have to go and where the machetes are, only a fool ought to notice.

First off this is a gross comparison. Second I'm not saying you out not to notice who your enemies are. I'm saying that you ought not to care. A subtle but profound difference.

This all reminds me of the movie Pleasantville.

What I most distinctively remember from it is that the kids are taught in public schools about the evils of STDs and teen pregnancy. It appears to me that condom-related sex ed was a major psy-op for the average middle-class teenager. Indeed, STDs are mostly transmitted by drug users and MSM, not the average encounter for the types of people most likely to conform to what the teachers say.

It really is propaganda, where characters of a 1950s' sitcom gain colors as they gradually go through a sped-up sexual revolution and some other modernization (not racial integration unfortunately)

"Pleasantville" is the kind of parable that encourages us to re-evaluate the good old days and take a fresh look at the new world we so easily dismiss as decadent. Yes, we have more problems. But also more solutions, more opportunities and more freedom. I grew up in the '50s. It was a lot more like the world of "Pleasantville" than you might imagine. Yes, my house had a picket fence, and dinner was always on the table at a quarter to six, but things were wrong that I didn't even know the words for.

We're already fully bathed in this type of propaganda, like fish in the sea, we don't even imagine that things could be different.

Second I'm not saying you out not to notice who your enemies are. I'm saying that you ought not to care.

Noticing is usually a first step toward action. You can't notice if you don't care, and you can't take action if you don't notice. What your hypothetical enemies want you to do is not care; they want you to only get upset if you actually see more white people than usual.

Indeed, STDs are mostly transmitted by drug users and MSM, not the average encounter for the types of people most likely to conform to what the teachers say.

This is true about GRID (also known as AIDS), but not true about other STDs. Syphilis and herpes spread quite quickly among users of heterosexual casual sex. This is because HIV has relatively low likelihood of transmission in penile-vaginal intercourse, in contrast to e.g. syphilis, which spread like wildfire around the world in 16th century in a matter of a couple of decades after the initial contact was made, despite much lower population mixing coefficient at the time.

Syphilis and herpes spread quite quickly among users of heterosexual casual sex.

This probably changed, but those STDs were not the target of sex ed propaganda in the 2000s. That movie is so over-the-top that I thought it was reverse-propaganda, and maybe it was, like Elysium.

which spread like wildfire around the world in 16th century in a matter of a couple of decades after the initial contact was made

Well the social order was much different then with more sex work, sailors and soldiers... It seems that syphilis went down thanks to antibiotics, not condoms or sex ed propaganda.

Advertisers by contrast are not stupid. Grifters and Parasites maybe, but not stupid.

By his argument, they don't have to be stupid, just ideologically comitted, which I think can easily argued. In related news: that Bud Light marketing chick has entered the chat.

I think the question that you, the person posting under the pseudonym @I_like_big_mottes, ought to be asking is "why do you care so much?" Why is your (and apparently so many other's) sense of self and feelings of validation so wrapped up in being represented on screen.

When they create a norm that tells me to be super sensitive about that kind of representation regarding other people, and then openly flaunt that norm regarding me, that will look like an insult, and I don't like being insulted.

Touche' re: Bud Light marketing chick, but I also find it notable how fast and hard InBev started to backpedal once they realized it might effect their bottom line. See penultimate commercial from my break down stream.

For one InBev that kinda sorta noticed there are Nike, Target, Disney and many others that keep being relentlessly woke.

That's odd because just the other day I was on twitter and found an entire account devoted to showing white men being humiliated or otherwise shown to be weak, stupid or childish in commercials: https://twitter.com/StupidWhiteAds/status/1724255095376781481#m

I cannot fathom how this would encourage anyone to buy Doritos if it turns you into a needy, tantrum-ridden child. Why would Doritos want this? Would anyone put this to air? Is there some parallel universe where this is considered good advertising?

encourage anyone to buy Doritos

"Doritos?"

True, true...

I would've thought they'd at least try to present their product in a positive light, even if that wasn't the primary purpose of the ad.

I mean, "product that makes you crazy for it" is a genre of ad that goes back to at least Honey Comb cereal.

When I was in highschool in the US midwest around 2007, I would flip through the cable channels when I was bored and note the race and sex of each person that was being shown as I changed to each channel. It was almost always white men. I pointed this out to other people and they thought it wasn't good. I haven't done this in years but I'm sure the demographics are not nearly as skewed in this way anymore.

Another conclusion that I could add to your list above is that the people in charge of casting in advertising are very worried about being seen as propagating white supremacy or making microaggressions toward minorities. They are not worried about white people being mad at them for not being represented because in the US it's culturally taboo to point out a lack of representation of white people. Basically advertisers are being socially conditioned to cast fewer white men.

I personally can't stand advertising and use ad blockers religiously. I would recommend it.

I have nothing to add about why there aren't as many white men in commercials, the cathedral, and representation, just an amusing anecdote.

I learned Spanish for work, and when google noticed this it started showing me ads with non-gay-coded white men again. It's just that those ads were in Spanish.

"This is to say there are literally no white men in TV commercials..."

I saw a Liberty Mutual ad 30 minutes ago on tv with two white men appearing to play '70s style cops

So concepts like “The Cathedral” or “The Deep State” have always elicited some amount of skepticism from me.

Why?

They're straightforwardly true and if you've managed to find the Motte at all I find it hard to believe you're the kind of unperceptive individual who wouldn't be able to read or understand the arguments being made. I can understand being skeptical of any new claim or term, but what exactly has you so incredulous?

I’ve managed to find the Motte, and I’m fairly incredulous of the terms, mostly for motte/bailey reasons.

There is a straightforwardly true version where the State, in its vastness, often lacks transparency and accountability. There’s also a straightforwardly false version where everyone who swears an oath of office immediately starts hearing the voice of Hillary Clinton. I find that many users of phrases like “Cathedral” are not particularly interested in epistemic hygiene, and err towards the latter version. Especially Moldbug, who I believe to be a sensationalist and possibly a grifter.

“What is new is not interesting, and what is interesting is not new.”

I'd tend to agree with this.

I have a general theory of conspiracy theories. It does not universally hold (e.g. it does a bad job with Atlantis or UFO conspiracies), but it often seems to work. That theory is that conspiracy theories usually work by bundling something obviously true with something obviously false. Once you muddy the ground between the obviously true and obviously false thing, the conspiracy theory is mostly achieved. All you have to do is convince someone of the obviously true thing in order to sneak in the obviously false part. Better yet, opponents of the conspiracy theory are just as likely to fall for your framing, and tie themselves in knots trying to refute the obviously true part because they think they have to go through it to reach the false part.

Some examples:

Deep state: It is obviously true that government business is often obscure or opaque, and that politicians, lobbyists, etc., influence government business for their own private interests. Likewise it is obviously true that government bureaucracy has its own culture and to an extent its own interests, and those influence decision-making. It is obviously false that there's an organised secretive organisation embedded in the government bureaucracy that's plotting to subvert democracy and implement their own nefarious and evil agenda.

Great Replacement: It is obviously true that the proportion of white people in the populations of various Western countries is decreasing, due to a combination of declining native birthrates and immigration from non-European countries. It is also obviously true that this immigration is supported by various national and international authorities. It is obviously false that there's an organised and secretive internationalist or United Nations or Jewish or Illuminati conspiracy to destroy the white race.

Zionism: It is obviously true that Jews are a relatively well-off group in the United States, that they're thus relatively politically influential, and that Jews tend to strongly support Israel. It is also obviously true that there's an Israel or Zionist lobby that influences the US government in pro-Israel ways. It is obviously false that a hidden and malicious conspiracy of global Jewry is puppeting the United States for its own agenda, which may be found in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

And so on. Typically the way the conspiracist frames it is that all you have to do is notice the obviously true thing and this is evidence of the obviously false part - and this is only supported by the way that their opponents tend to downplay or discourage discussion of the obviously true thing, lest it lead to the false thing. At the worst part of the argument, the obviously true thing by itself is treated as a dog-whistle for the obviously false thing and thus forbidden - which only helps the conspiracist overall.

I don't think it fails on UFO theories. The true thing is "we can't identify everything we see in the sky", i.e. "literal unidentified flying objects are reasonably common".

It is obviously false that there's an organised secretive organisation embedded in the government bureaucracy that's plotting to subvert democracy and implement their own nefarious and evil agenda.

If you remove "secretive" and replace "embedded in" with "which is", and also replace "plotting" with "acts as" - why it is obviously false? Especially if we assume their own agenda is to grab as much power as they possibly could and never let it go and never allow any restriction and reduction of their size and their influence? It's not obvious to me at all that this is false. It certainly looks consistent with the empirical data.

Well, yes, if you change the statement so that it's asserting something else entirely, it is no longer obviously false. That's straightforward enough.

But it's not "something else entirely". The only change is that a) it's not secretive and b) there's no explicit plotting as designated activity, otherwise the claim is the same, the result is the same. And I would claim most "conspiracy theorists" would agree with me that this is an acceptable description of what they claim is true about the deep state. If you ask any of them "if we assume all you say about deep state is true, except for the secret plotting part - there's actually no any documents called "plot" and all the actions are taken in the open - would you say it confirms what you thought or overthrows it completely?" - I think nearly every one would say "confirms".

if you take

organisation which is the government bureaucracy that's plotting to implement their own nefarious and evil agenda.

then for me I do not need to look far, and noone is denying that Russia, North Korea or Iran exists (feel free to replace with USA, Israel, Ukraine and France or other applicable set like Sudan, Brazil and Ethiopia).

The interesting part of conspiracy theories is positing extra actors which are relevant, organised and secret.

If you are looking for "my country leadership is acting against me" or "world is not union of happy cooperating countries" you get far less disputed vision of reality. If you go for "jewry of world in secret tries to harm me" or "all capitalists secretly cooperate in perfect union" then I am expecting a really good evidence, not youtube video or some tired screed like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

To assume that groups like "all Jews" or "all capitalists" have a lot of common interests and their intersection is substantial and brings them to concerted action is quite contrary to observed evidence. Jews are notoriously disagreeing on pretty much everything - thus the saying "two Jews - three opinions", including such things as if Israel existing is a good thing (there are Jews that think it isn't, as we unfortunately just recently confirmed) and a myriad other lesser issues. Same for capitalists - judging by the donations and public expressions, there is a capitalist behind pretty much every ideological stance (including, mind-bogglingly, one that declares capitalists should be shot and their wealth should be taken away). In this situation believing in such concerted action requires going against a lot of evidence and experience.

However, if we take the government bureaucracy, evidence suggests they frequently act in concert, these actions are frequently not in the interest of those who they nominally serve, and these actions are frequently aimed at increasing their power and almost never aimed at the reverse. In this situation, believing that they are "deep state" requires dismissing no evidence and embracing all of it. There's the difference.

Especially Moldbug, who I believe to be a sensationalist and possibly a grifter.

I agree with you, and I'm on the record as not bothering to read his articles anymore.

But I find the rest of your post a bit odd because that kind of approach reliably generates bad information and decreases your level of understanding. The extremes are very obviously wrong, but there's a useful concept here that conveys accurate information about the world. The Deep State is something that undeniably exists and has influence in the world, and the concept doesn't stop being useful because a REAL QANON PATRIOT blames the Deep State for why he keeps getting parking tickets.

It’s most effective for Internet discussions, to be sure.

The mistake is in thinking that "decreasing the level of understanding" is a bug rather than a feature. Grifters don't want people to understand, they want pliable followers they can grift.

UK. I flicked on the most popular commercial station while I wrote this which was showing reality contest dreck that's carefully produced to appeal to as many viewers as possible.

Halfway through an ad break when I switched on:

Supermarket - white man cooking Christmas dinner for his white family
Mattress - white man solo
Washing powder - multi ethnic races and genders, white man in background, black man in foreground
Whiskey - black woman solo
Toothpaste - brown woman solo
Perfume - white woman solo

Next full ad break:

Theme park - multi ethnic group of kids, white grandma
Make-up - multi ethnic women, brown and black focus, whites in background
Indigestion remedy - multi ethnic
Perfume - white woman solo celebrity
Supermarket - glimpse of white hand
Bubble bath - brown woman
Bleach - glimpse of brown hand
Flagship phone - white woman
Butter - white man, brown woman
Stock cubes - white family

The only thing I can note in support of your point is that the non-white people tend to appear more emphasised. In the white-centric adverts the emphasis leaned more towards the product, and the more non-white people there were the more the camera gazed at them.

Monday Night Football, Chicago vs Minneapolis, Southwestern US, broadly similar results

  • Beer Commercial - Working class guys working hard and celebrating with a beer afterward
  • Local Tourist Attraction - multi-ethnic group of parents and kids (predominantly White and Hispanic)
  • Supermarket - white grandma goes shopping and teaches grandkids to cook.
  • Car Commercial - driver not shown, generic "movie trailer guy" style voice over
  • Movie Trailer - Hispanic Guy (Joaquin Phoenix) bangs white woman (Vanessa Kirby) and conquers Europe. Easily most offensive commercial in the batch from a WN perspective ;-)
  • Deodorant commercial - Weird
  • Cosmetics commercial - Attractive white woman
  • Erectile dysfunction remedy - older black couple
  • Another beer commercial - 'Murica (please forgive us)
  • Add for channel [X] news - Stay tuned after the game for an older white guy and a hot Latina with fantastic tits.

...and we are back to the game.

Okay, this got me curious so I tried it for the second period of tonight's hockey game, as viewed on a semi-local feed in Canada. For the most part only the people most prominently featured are mentioned.

  • Grocery store - White family. Daughter (who looks about 13) firmly in charge, dad prominent but made to look kind of goofy (the mother is a bit of a space cadet too). Other ads in same campaign involve them interacting with the (white) president of the company.
  • Building supplies - Everyone I noticed in the ad was white.
  • Bank - In rough order of prominence, black guy I assume is a minor celebrity, black woman realtor, white family (only the wife is featured prominently).
  • Pizza - Ethnically diverse group of friends watching a sporting event. There was a white male in there.
  • Lottery (tied to one of the teams involved in the game) - White male celebrity (current captain of said team).
  • Restaurant - Couple that appeared to be an east Asian but very Westernized male and a somewhat less integrated south Asian female.
  • Quaker Oats (more their sponsorship of minor hockey than their products, though these get their spot) - No humans particularly prominent. Most people seen incidentally seem to be white.
  • Grocery store (different from the first one) - No humans shown, only products.
  • Sports team (one of the ones playing) - White male celebrity.
  • Restaurant - No people prominently shown, only their food. (White hand briefly seen.)
  • Apple iPhone - Black household that seem to be college roomies or something.
  • Car - Centered around a white female/east Asian male couple, some similarly diverse friends are briefly seen.

There's actually less emphasis on diversity than I would naively have expected, though there's certainly more than there would be in, say, 1984.

Also, no ads particularly geared to farming and no ads for sports betting (though these get small spots outside actual commercial breaks, which I didn't count). These would have loomed large in a game shown on CBC, I'm sure.

EDIT: Much more notably underrepresented than whites were aboriginal Canadians and South Asians. When I look at my city, even in the expensive apartment complex where I mostly work, I see way more of these demographics than I do on television, even fairly woke television. I don't think I saw a clearly aboriginal face even though I'd expect there to be some among the construction workers seen in the second ad. Blacks are way overrepresented, no doubt partially due to spillover from the US. I'd say whites and East Asians are represented about right. "Hispanic" as its own distinctive group is barely a thing here.

There was one ad (not noted above) I'd characterize as very woke, but not in an obnoxious way. It consisted of a South Asian man talking about how Bell Canada's support had helped him move to Canada, learn English (and he was pretty well-spoken though he did retain a noticeable accent) as well as gaining technical skills, and build a new life here, over re-enactments of key moments in his early time here.

Most of what I watch on live-ish television are hockey games on Canadian channels, and I'd expect results much like yours except that ads for farm equipment would be a noticeable presence. (Which would show predominantly white farmers.)

Hispanic Guy (Joaquin Phoenix)

Seriously? (I will assume this is sarcastic...)

His parents were named John Lee Bottom and Arlyn "Heart" Dunetz.

"His father was a Catholic from Fontana, California, and was of English, German and French ancestry.[7] His maternal grandfather, Meyer Dunetz, was Russian Jewish..."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joaquin_Phoenix#Early_life

They were hippies that gave their other kids names like River and Liberty.

(I will assume this is sarcastic...)

In case the smiley and following line weren't enough of a clue, yes I was being facetious.

Props to you for sacrificing several minutes of your life to test this theory.

  • Large conspiracies like faking the moon landing would require so many people to be in on it as to be impossible to maintain. So concepts like “The Cathedral”

The whole point of "The Cathedral" is that it is not a conspiracy. It is a phenomenon of distributed, public coordination -- there is no inner-party doing the coordination.. It is a herd. A very powerful, important herd, and one that continually defies any attempt to be named. There are microconspiracies within the Cathedral (journolist, Climategate, etc.) There are super-influencers who to some extent can move the herd. But the overall phenomena is a herd phenomena that is not generally based on secret coordination, but rather everyone looking to their left and to their right to stay in line. "The Cathedral" has a very enviable ability in that every time someone tries to coin a term for it "The System" "The Establishment" "The Uniparty" they manage to make associate usage of the term with being a kook or "conspiracy theorist."

Other potential answers, since we're brainstorming.

  1. The talent isn't there. White male actors may be pursuing longer-term roles, not ad spots. The revenue per hour for ads may be only worthwhile if one is modeling/acting as a side gig. Career models/actors may not be interested in bit parts. There may not be room/budget for a Jim Varney these days.

  2. You are consuming media not meant for 'valuable white men' to consume. 18-30 men are being given mass-market brands to remember when they finally earn real disposable income. After aging out of that demographic, the rules change for which white men to pursue. If you don't have an expensive hobby, you may not be worth targeting.

Life imitates art. The less whites are represented in art and culture, even something as incidental as ads, the more ire gets directed at them for being mistakenly "over represented" in the real world. It filters into college admissions, hiring, governance, more art, etc, etc. It just creates an overall zeitgeist that white people aren't supposed to be here. It's demoralization, plain and simple.

Don't give money to people who hate you.

Don't give money to people who hate you.

but does this apply to a faceless corp? you are giving money to shareholders , which is technically anyone who has a retirement account with index fund exposure. In the case of Twitter though, buying a Twitter premium subscription does give the $10 directly to Musk

The money used to pay that filth comes from somewhere no?.

Right. How many wealthier conservative white men who aren't particularly culturally aggrieved - but are economically savvy - have attained that status, indirectly, by advertising (read cultural) trends that do not put the likes of them front and center?

My theory is that if you want to sell to (white) men, you'd better show female on screen. And it's better because if you are subtle enough you can even score feminism point while using women as sex objects

I think it's indicative of just how far we've fallen that this even needs to be explained to people.

Representation does matter, but those making the decisions are so ideologically committed that they’re willing to hurt their own bottom line in order to “do the right thing.” They’re so committed to their ideals that they’re willing to depress their own effectiveness by more than 30%.

Except it's not this straightforward, for two reasons. First, try proving that these decisions are actually hurting the bottom line. As the old quote attributed to various famous businessmen goes: "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half." Advertising is anything but an exact science, and business outcomes are subject to many hard-to-disentangle factors. So how would one convince bosses or coworkers that this isn't the way to get more business?

Secondly, the interests and incentives of an institution are not the interests and incentives of the people within it. As I've seen it put elsewhere (particularly in discussions of the police, but also other fields), the first and highest job duty of any employee is not what it says on their job description, it's to make the boss happy. Of course, the usual way one does so is by performing the specific tasks for which one was hired, but those are ultimately just means to that end. If your boss insists on something being done a particular way, a particular way that's stupid and costs the business money, and instead you do it a different way that saves the business money, how do you suppose it will impact your continued employment if the boss finds out?

I've seen multiple people point out with respect to the whole Bud Light thing, that while going with Mulvaney may not have been a good choice for the business as a whole, it was probably the best choice for the advertising people who originally recommended that course with regards to their future employment opportunities elsewhere within the advertising industry, particularly as compared to the opposite strategy. "Nobody gets fired for buying IBM" and all that.

So nobody need actually go "I'm doing this no matter how much money it costs me!" They need only have uncertainty as to what will or won't cost the business more customers, combined with a solid understanding of what best suits their own personal, long-term job interests independent of a particular company's interests.

Secondly, the interests and incentives of an institution are not the interests and incentives of the people within it. As I've seen it put elsewhere (particularly in discussions of the police, but also other fields), the first and highest job duty of any employee is not what it says on their job description, it's to make the boss happy.

Advertising is a subject , which, like nutrition advice, no one really seems to know any anything, or nothing is definitive or set in stone. Why does McDonald's advertise so much when everyone is already aware it exists? But Facebook never does? I dunno. Companies advertise to create demand and awareness for the product. this seems obvious. but also to send a message, which can explain ads which lack any sort of call to action or product.

Yeah, that was my point #1. Since you can't prove which ads cause what, it makes the whole industry somewhat insulated from immediate "hard contact with reality" feedback, leading to field-wide dominance of "vibes" and the primary incentives being personal rather than institutional.

This is not to say that white men are somewhat underrepresented, that despite being 31% of the US population, they’re only 15% of those being cast in ads, or something along those lines. This is to say that there are literally no white men in TV commercials. You can watch ad-supported TV for hours and not see a single one. For a while I noticed that white men were allowed to be shown, but only if there was a non-white, non-male onscreen with them. But more recently the trend has been to simply not show them at all.

yeah, blacks are 13% of US population yet have 70+% representation in ads, it seems. Same for govt. work (not just blacks but other minorities too). Some stereotypes are true.

The really screwy thing about black representation in ads is that the 70% despite being only 13% elides that a huge number of these black people in ads are generic middle class black people (often, but blessedly less than in the past, light skinned). For a people who are disproportionately poor, it really seems like the TV ad execs want to ignore that most black people exist.

Most? What percentage of black Americans do you think live below the poverty line?

Last I knew it was something in the low 20's percent range, although I'll cop to not having checked in a while. I think it has drifted downward into the high-middle teens over the last five or so years.

But, importantly, median incomes for blacks are still very low. In 2020, median household income for black Americans was $45,000~. It's a shifted curve so, while there are plenty of upper middle class blacks like show up in commercials, there are fewer as a proportion than, for example, Asians.

They can't ignore them, they have to counter-balance the existing signal.

Less well-adjusted black people show up in the news for murder, sex trafficking, carjacking, shoplifting, brawls, failing schools... When there's a successful one in a talk-show they often have some kind of sob-story of under-privileged community, overcoming some system's injustice or other...

It appears that the only chance to see successful Blacks in respectable professions (not political/grievance activism but as judge, police chief, surgeon...) or as quiet, satisfied customers is when they are acting, directed by non-blacks.

It appears that the only chance to see successful Blacks in respectable professions (not political/grievance activism but as judge, police chief, surgeon...) or as quiet, satisfied customers is when they are acting, directed by non-blacks.

Alternatively, I could take my dog for a walk.

Yes you the lucky few who gets to live in a blue neighborhood with the right balance of diversity that white people feel proud that their kids have a balanced learning environment enriched with a certain je-ne-sais-quoi that corporate elites love to broadcast, but not such that the local schools scores go down too sharply.

Supposedly you're not walking your dog by the projects.

It appears that you're not the target for these 'black people are wonderful but in a relatable way' ads.

I think I'm getting it, unsuccessful black people: bad, successful black people: bad.

If you want to see black people in respectable professions, all you have to do is go to where the people with respectable professions live. I'm not sure about "wonderful", but they're certainly reasonably relatable.

The diversity propaganda is absurd and oppressive and very obviously intentionally so, but that doesn't make the large percentage of reasonable, peaceable, moderately successful black people stop existing.

There's considerable variation on this.

all you have to do is go to where the people with respectable professions live.

Then I'd see white people, Indians, Asians. There's only so many middle-class black people to go around, and they are not equally distributed across the country.

but that doesn't make the large percentage of reasonable, peaceable, moderately successful black people stop existing.

Police chiefs, judges and surgeons are not 'moderately successful' imo. My point is that these people are largely invisible to the average American, except on TV, where they are mostly race-hustlers, or paid actors at work.

The average American knows that 'black' neighborhoods are not places you want to spend too much time in, 'black' schools are not places they want their kids to attend, and unless they personally know Mr Smith down the street, a black face in their neighborhood is cause for some concern.

There's a spectrum of black people Americans interact with, I'm not saying you have to be a surgeon to be respectable / not a petty criminal.

The ones that ads usually portray are basically 'average middle-class white American but dark-skinned' and I really don't think that's that common. For example the rates of parents having children together within wedlock etc are different.

Then I'd see white people, Indians, Asians. There's only so many middle-class black people to go around, and they are not equally distributed across the country.

Black people of any class aren't equally distributed around the country. famously, 51% of suspensions from school given to black students as punishment were given in the 13 states of the former Confederacy... which is where 51% of black students live, because it's where 51% of black people live.

Police chiefs, judges and surgeons are not 'moderately successful' imo.

Pretty sure black police chiefs aren't exactly rare IRL. Judges I have no idea about, but I do enjoy Clarence Thomas. Surgeons I have no idea about, but would expect "Blacks less likely" to apply.

The average American knows that 'black' neighborhoods are not places you want to spend too much time in

Sure.

'black' schools are not places they want their kids to attend

Sure.

and unless they personally know Mr Smith down the street, a black face in their neighborhood is cause for some concern.

Nope. There's too many middle-class black people where I live, way too far from the actual ghetto, for this to be a realistic concern. This isn't the 60s. Nice neighborhoods don't turn to shit overnight when blacks flood in from the ghetto. We've built an elaborate social system that pretty well precludes that particular mistake from being repeated, barring overwhelming and abrupt government action. The blacks moving in can afford the housing prices, which means they've more or less got their shit together.

The ones that ads usually portray are basically 'average middle-class white American but dark-skinned' and I really don't think that's that common.

And I'm telling you that "average middle class white american but dark-skinned" is what a notable portion of my neighbors look like. I'm lower-middle-class. I'm an artist, I don't make programmer money. My wife and I together are barely making it into six figures. We are not big shots, and neither are our neighbors, and yet a fair number of them are black.

Why would this be surprising? Given that Blacks are Less Likely, and given that most people are doing pretty okay, you should expect the bell curve on Black economic status to have a fat left tail and generally be shifted leftward, but otherwise to have roughly the same shape per-capita. So there's a lot more poor blacks and a lot less rich blacks relative to whites, but the middle portion of the graph is going to be fairly similar.

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Having noticed something similar, I'd suggest that there may be a third conclusion:

  • Advertising to white men is not a good return on investment.

Advertisers have been very open about differences in spending behaviors between genders in the past.

Combine those differences with women's generally higher outgroup preferences, and "advertise to a woman's sensibilities until she nags a guy to buy the product" might be a winning move.

It's incredible. Immediately following the quotes from the female study participant about how much she loves the intrinsic experience of shopping and the male study participant about how he sees shopping as a means to an end, the researcher baselessly speculates that women have been conditioned by society to be caregivers while men are all a bunch of overgrown children whose love of shopping has "atrophied" due to years of relying on women to do it for them.

It's like these people are allergic to the concept of individual agency.

I believe advertising/marketing is a highly female profession, and throwing out some crap nobody cares about along feminist lines might be necessary to get the customers to calm down about the ‘women be shopping’ implications.

It's like these people are allergic to the concept of individual agency.

Inferential distance strikes again.

Reminds me of the scuffle over…was it Pampers? The people complaining on Twitter had probably never bought a diaper between them.

There’s also the corollary,

  • Advertising to white men doesn’t require showing pictures of white men.

Humor has been popular but risky. Hot white women, also a proud tradition. Really, apply any of the usual advertising strategies to associate your product with wealth, success and virility.

I have also noticed this on the webpage of my county's public library system. I go to that website constantly to manage hold requests - basically without exception I access it at least once a week. There are always pictures of people on the front page. In five years, I have only ever seen one white man there: it was Walter Isaacson, who was speaking at a special event hosted by the library.

At this moment it is a picture of a black man and a mixed-race child.

If there's something interesting about this, it's that the phenomenon you're describing exists beyond ad agencies.

I think the question is whether this is kind of a Schelling point that corporations all converge on 'naturally' because of ambient incentives, like how they all use some variation of Corporate Memphis art in their publications, or if there's some thumb(s) on the scale in a more direct way, even if it is behind the scenes.

It is safe enough to conclude that this isn't the result of some purely random selection effects or a specifically meritorious process.

Honestly I see an argument for both of the options (and the truth is probably a combination of both). On the one hand you probably have some suits running numbers and noticing that commercials featuring a black male lead to .3% better sales down the line. But there's also probably some internal DEI office at the corporation which coordinates with some well-funded NGO to ensure that their ads are sufficiently multicultural in order to avoid a bad publicity blitz or something.

And between these pressures it becomes much simpler to cast nonwhite races and since there's no backlash it becomes standard practice.

An experiment would be to try watching broadcast TV in, say Mexico, or Japan, or an Arabic country and seeing if there's a similar noticeable phenomenon. (While I admit to not having tried this experiment, I will bet large sums that most of those commercials feature the ethnicity that is most common within that country).

there's some thumb(s) on the scale in a more direct way, even if it is behind the scenes

ESG investing is that thumb. Trillions of dollars in funds are earmarked for ESG (environmental, social and governance), the better a company's score on ESG metrics, the more investment they get from these funds. These metrics mostly measure how much a company aligns with the mainstream green, globalist, liberal thought-complex (to avoid mentioning The Cathedral). The thought-complex wants to see less white men in ads, so companies will obey, to the extent they can avoid damaging their sales too much, to qualify for this investment money.

(to avoid mentioning The Cathedral)

Awkward constructions like this are why I still appreciate and use the term Cathedral even though I don't actually like Moldbug's writing.

It is useful to have a term to describe this phenomenon everyone who's paying attention sees, but escapes having simple way to name or describe it. You can't just say it's one party, because it's clearly in control of multiple parties, sometimes all the major ones, in multiple countries. It's not just one single ideology because it will adopt incoherent positions to further itself. It's not a conspiracy because it's participants are for the most part unaware they're in it, and its direction is the emergent result of the process that build it rather than human will. I would call it a manifestation of the centralizing forces that build up in complex human organisations, but that's just how I explain it.

But there's also probably some internal DEI office at the corporation which coordinates with some well-funded NGO to ensure that their ads are sufficiently multicultural in order to avoid a bad publicity blitz or something.

I'd suggest that "Nobody got fired for buying IBM casting minority actors in their commercials."

Actually Latin American media productions and notoriously lily white despite their countries not being.

You can chalk certain things up to the fact that actors will inevitably be prettier than the average citizen.

I mean, lets also consider that a huge portion of Americans are obese and yet you're unlikely to see actors with high BMI in commercials for similar reasons. Unless its for women's casual fashion brands.

You would hardly be the first or last person to make that observation on the discrepancy between pure demographics and advertising, be it here on the Motte or elsewhere. That's not the same thing as this being false, it's obviously true for anyone who has eyes, but it's been debated ad-nauseum here.

Thankfully my diligent use of ad-block prevents such visual and auditory pollution from entering my sensoria, most of the time. That's ads themselves, regardless of content. May the day come soon when AR filters get rid of them from my perception of non-digital reality.

Thankfully my diligent use of ad-block prevents such visual and auditory pollution from entering my sensoria, most of the time.

It's not just ads though, but also stock images, staged photographs for college admission pamphlets, product pictures on Amazon, etc. (you can always quickly identify cheap Chinese imports on Amazon: they're the only ones with product pictures showing white people using the product).

I'm sure you can probably find white people in ads for euthanasia in Canada, at least.

It's increasingly difficult to find any refuge from the daily barrage of reminders that your society is signaling it hates you and is excited for you and your kind to die off.

Huh. The first few stock images that come to mind are a mixed bag. Harold, old white guy. “Why can’t I hold all these limes,” young black guy. “Distracted boyfriend,” three white people, one of whom is male. Maybe those are just dated?

Googling “stock photo” and looking at the first page of results gives a bunch of white people, mostly solo. The first black guy is playing a saxophone—does that count as stereotyping? There are a few Middle Eastern men, a couple Indians, and a single dog.

So I’m not really seeing it.

I work in video games, you may recall. I've recently been making art for the in-game stories, and for promotional material. It has been communicated to the art team that representing diversity is a requirement in every image by default, with rare exceptions. Diversity means non-white and/or female, preferably both. Exceptions are images depicting individual characters (some of whom are still allowed to be white, but of course are balanced by the requirement that other characters be non-white) or bad guys, who are of course not subject to diversity requirements. Assuming you aren't depicting a villain, white characters are required to be balanced by diverse characters. Diverse characters are themselves, of course, balanced already and need no corresponding balancing.

I'm a little amused that we're still debating whether this sort of thing is happening. It's absolutely happening.

Sorry, I was focused on the stock photo part, which is where the OP didn’t fit my intuition.

I recognize that Representation only gets invoked one way, and that it’s doing so more often now than it did in 2009. Your explanation downthread regarding the risk/reward of pissing off Twitter is convincing.

Can you describe how these instructions are given to you? Does your manager tell you this directly? Are these commands issued to your whole team from somewhere else?

Every time we made a piece of art that didn't have POC/gender balance in it, our boss told us it wasn't diverse enough and we had to remake it to be more diverse. This complaint never was made for anything involving villains. It took a dozen iterations before we started internally discussing where to put the diversity in a given image during the planning stage, and we still frequently are told that the images aren't diverse enough and we need to add more. Any time we do an early mockup with stock images that aren't themselves diverse, we're reminded that the finished version has to be diverse. I'm indy; the boss tells us directly.

Have you ever asked why?

Video games with more diverse characters don't seem to sell more.

I don't need to ask why. I've sat through a couple impromptu diversity lectures over the years. Both the indy space and Triple-A are completely dominated by progressive voices. The entire gaming press ecosystem is rabidly progressive. Influencers are more balanced, but everyone the boss knows and everyone the boss respects, cares about, and wants to impress are all on one side. You want to show your game at PAX, you want buzz, you want people cheering you on and giving you good press, well, there's a set of beliefs and behaviors that get you that, and there's another set of beliefs and behaviors that definately will not.

I could give more examples, but I'll leave it there for OPSEC purposes.

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I assume HelmedHorror is listing the use cases for stock photos where they perceive the problem, not necessarily listing stock photos as a separate category that also has the problem. To the general question of Stock Photos, when I load up the Shutterstock home page, the Explore Popular and Handpicked visuals seems to have eight pictures with humans, and the only white man in the mix is Santa Claus (possible another man but he is too small to tell for sure).

All of your examples seem to be fairly old (5+ years?) memes, which technically started their life as stock-photos but are probably non-central examples of stock-photos, in as much as they are still used today.

Yeah, on further consideration, you’re probably right.

Huh. The first few stock images that come to mind are a mixed bag. Harold, old white guy. “Why can’t I hold all these limes,” young black guy. “Distracted boyfriend,” three white people, one of whom is male. Maybe those are just dated?

Googling “stock photo” and looking at the first page of results gives a bunch of white people, mostly solo. The first black guy is playing a saxophone—does that count as stereotyping? There are a few Middle Eastern men, a couple Indians, and a single dog.

So I’m not really seeing it.

If you had to search for it, perhaps it's because you're not paying attention when you come across it organically.

Let's try this. I'll go one-by-one to websites from Fortune 500 companies in descending order and see how white or nonwhite the photos of people on their home page are. Sound pretty objective? Alright, let's play.

  1. Walmart. Black guy.
  2. Amazon. Bunch of product images. I don't really feel like revealing to the world what Amazon wants me to buy again.
  3. ExxonMobile. First guy is poorly lit but the face look kind of black to me when zooming in. Either way, the next person is a black woman too, followed by a white man.
  4. Apple. Black woman (on the watch).
  5. UnitedHealth Group. Asians.
  6. CVSHealth. Female is ambiguous, but the guy is nonwhite.
  7. Berkshire Hathaway. No photos of people.
  8. Alphabet. No photos of people.
  9. McKesson. Black woman.
  10. Chevron. White woman.
  11. Cencora. White woman. Nonwhites are nonetheless 3 out of 5 of the people whose races are visible on the home page.
  12. Costco. Two black people.
  13. Microsoft. Black person. 4 out of 5 of those with visible faces on the home page are nonwhite.
  14. Cardinal Health. Ambiguous, but I'd say multiracial.
  15. Cigna. A white male!
  16. Marathon Petroleum. 2 out of 3 white.
  17. Phillips 66. 2 out of 3 nonwhite.
  18. Valero Energy. Some of the people on the boat seem white, but they're distant and backs are turned. First face is black.
  19. Ford. White guy, followed by ambiguous woman and 4/6 of the remainder being black
  20. Home Depot. Two black guys, ambiguous woman, white guy
  21. General Motors. 8 out of 10 nonwhite
  22. Elevance Health. Black.
  23. JPMorgan Chase. Hispanic? A majority of the remainder of the homepage are nonwhites.
  24. Kroger. No photos, but 3 out of 4 of the cartoon characters are nonwhite.
  25. Centene. Black.
  26. Verizon. Nonwhite.
  27. Walgreens Boots Alliance. Well, not exactly a stock photo: they're announcing their new Chief Information Officer, a white guy. The next slide in the auto-rotating display is 5 nonwhite out of 7.
  28. Fannie Mae. Nonwhite.
  29. Comcast. 2 out of 3 nonwhite.
  30. AT&T. Asian, I think?

You get the idea.

The effect is so strong that at some point pictures of single young white urban men in advertising have become gay-coded. Usually if I see such an ad on my commute it's trying to sell me PrEP.

product pictures on Amazon, etc.

Is this true?

When I search Amazon for the word 'shirt,' in the first 3 rows on images, 8 models are white, 4 are non-white.

Do you see something different when you search the word 'shirt'? Did you have some other set of categories you were talking about?

It's increasingly difficult to find any refuge from the daily barrage of reminders that your society is signaling it hates you and is excited for you and your kind to die off.

Well, why should your society, given that it hates you and is excited for you and your kind to die off, allow you any such refuge?

May the day come soon when AR filters get rid of them from my perception of non-digital reality.

"I'm sorry sir, it looks like you have installed unapproved software on your McGoggles™, report to your nearest Best Buy™ for a replacement pair. The route is being superimposed on your field of vision until you arrive. Your Tesla™ Model Q™ is already waiting to transport you. Likewise, your Amazon Prime™ account is suspended until you've watched 2 hours of content to satisfy your backlog of weekly Adwatch™ to cover server costs. We appreciate your business."

I manage to use ad-block and root my phone, I think I'll manage, can't make promises about the rest of you!

I never watch ads, but just as a spot check I logged out of my Youtube account and turned of adblock and started clicking around. The first time I saw human faces onscreen in an ad it was 1 white man, 1 white woman, and 1 black man walking together and appearing at the same time. The next ad started in a locker room with a bunch of players huddled up, 3 in the middle of the screen were white men and then maybe 4-5 other men of other races around the periphery.

Maybe cable television is different, I think I literally don't know a single person in my immediate social circle who still watches that?

As another spot check, the first 5 ads in the list of 2023 Superbowl ads all have pretty prominent white guys. I stopped checking after 5, but you can click through the rest if that's instructive.

Edit: Also there's this. Which, I don't even know where they're getting the data, I'm having a hard time googling summaries that show their sources. But this like all the summaries I'm finding seems to flatly disagree with your observation, so I dunno.

I dunno, my random sampling is very small but disagreed with your impression as strongly as it could have. Maybe it's something about which channels you're watching?

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