Is it possible that the contest among the Super Bowl commercials has become more riveting to the masses than the actual contest?
I’m starting to think it is. And this year there are even more decibels to the buzz, thanks to two controversial spots that have created a stadium-sized controversy. They push the buzzer on hot- button issues in a way that no Super Bowl advertising in recent memory has done.
The first contretemps swirls around a pro-life message that comes to us courtesy of the group Focus on the Family.
For years, advocacy advertising of any kind was commercial non grata in the Super Bowl. None of the networks wanted to interrupt America’s ecstasy of wings and nachos with anything that was politically charged. No discomfort was permitted to enter the domed bubble of the massively hyped event. But CBS accepted the spot, and we don’t know why. Was it financially driven, did CBS officials feel the culture was finally ready, or were they convinced that the commercial itself wasn’t an incendiary trigger-point?
The advertising features football star Tim Tebow and his mother, Pam. She recounts the story of Tim’s difficult, high-risk pregnancy and the choice she made to go through with it.
Love it or hate it, from a purely communications point of view it succeeds in delivering its message with an emotional wallop. Tim is a living, breathing and successful example of her ultimate decision.
And it’s a clever angle. It doesn’t take the conventional route of the young single girl who could carry to term and then deliver the baby to loving parents who can’t conceive on their own. Rather, it uses a more complex situation – potential health risks to the mother and the fetus, a medical question. The pro-life crowd comes across as less ideological and more thoughtful.
The other controversial spot is for ManCrunch.com, a gay dating site. CBS rejected the spot, which is no doubt the best thing that could have happened to the company. Millions of dollars in free publicity, and millions saved on Super Bowl advertising.
CBS has put itself in a curious and, I think, fundamentally indefensible position by letting the issues-driven “Focus” spot crash the Super Bowl party but not allowing a gay dating site to air. And the timing is ironic: President Barack Obama just said he will reverse “don’t ask, don’t tell” policies. Is CBS’ policy “don’t ask, don’t date”?
Even without those two debacles, each year the media’s fascination with the advertising angle seems to start earlier and grow more frenetic. The game becomes a 30-second Rosetta Stone for reporters looking to decode the latest American hieroglyphics.
It’s an economic indicator: How much a 30-second spot costs is a proxy for how strong the economy is. (It’s reported that a commercial on CBS costs somewhere between $2.5 million and $2.8 million, slightly less than the $3 million NBC raked in a year ago.)
It’s a gender indicator: How women are portrayed – as objectified objects of desire or “empowered” females – is a measure of ongoing battles.
It’s a brand indicator: Who has pulled out – Pepsi – is contrasted with who has the cash to jump in.
It’s a cultural indicator: The visual and thematic elements of the spots are a window into our present state-of-mind. Are they absurdist, ha-ha funny, schmaltzy? What do the anthropomorphic frogs, aliens, rodents or aardvarks tell us? Are we dazzled by escapist fantasies? Those packed 30-second sonnets telegraph volumes.
So Super Bowl commercials are a chance for the nation to come together, watch a bunch of big companies trying to sell us stuff, and then vote for our favorites Monday morning. It’s nothing less than the capitalist Oscars.