WHERE SUCCESSFUL ADVERTISING MEETS LGBT EQUALITY

ViacomCBS, The Motherload

Members:

A teenager is sitting at his computer in his bedroom when his younger brother comes in carrying a basketball and asks, "Hey, what are you watching?" Preoccupied, he answers, "Comedy Central's Motherload."

Perplexed, the basketball-toting brother clarifies: "Motherload?"

"Motherload."

The little brother asks, "Why do they call it that?"

He responds, "Because it's got awesome clips from South Park, Chapelle show, Drawn Together, and never before seen stuff."

"Like what?"

Annoyed, the big brother says, "I don't know yet. It's never before seen." His little brother begs, "Let me watch!"

"No," he insists.

He asks, "Why?" and his brother tells him, "Because you're bugging me."

Looking smug, the younger brother says, "Just came to tell you Melissa called last night."
Suddenly interested, his brother asks, "Did you tell her I'd call her back?"

Smiling, his little brother brags, "I told her you were gay."

The voiceover chimes in: "We can't kill your little brother. We can give you thousands of videos from your favorite Comedy Central shows really, really fast. Motherload, only from comedycentral.com"

The ad earns an "Equal" rating because the older brother's frustration at being labeled "gay" is based in the fact that it complicates the crush he has on the girl that called. He does not express any hostility towards homosexuality in general.

User Comments
Terrence
Most viewers would consider this ad negative. If instead of chasing his little brother, if he said "ah, why did you have to say that for? There is nothing wrong with being gay, but I'm not. Now she might think I'm not interested in her" or something along those lines, then you might conclude that he did "not express any hostility towards homosexuality" and was only frustrated with how it "complicated" his interest in this girl. Since being called gay is one of the worst things you can call a young guy, and he chased after his brother to "kill" him, I'd say he was definitely "expressing hostility" to being called gay. The casual use of labeling someone gay to insult only serves to normalize and minimize this hurtful activity. Again, which is negative and hostile to homosexuality.