Sydney Sweeney’s abominable ad sets back women in sports by a decade
Sydney Sweeney is once again at the centre of a bad advertisement campaign, and honestly she just needs to go away. At this point, we are begging for her to go away.
Swing and a miss
Recently, an advertisement for Novig, a new peer-to-peer sports betting company in the U.S., had Sweeney essentially nude, holding athletic equipment in a suggestive manner and repeating the phrase, “just sports.” The ad moves through Sweeney playing tennis in underwear, wearing a hockey jersey with no bottoms, covering her bare chest with her hands, and so on.
Aside from the fact the advertisement is abominable, I honestly had no idea what it was even selling until I looked up what Novig was. Sweeney does talk about gambling near the end but as a non-gambler, it did nothing to sell the point.
Sweeney is not a stranger to advertisement campaigns backfiring in her face. In 2025, she did a campaign for American Eagle Jeans. It described how she has perfect jeans ie., the ones she’s wearing, but the play was on her genetics: blonde hair and blue eyes. Perfect genes! Anyways, let’s get back to the current damage.
Here’s the thing: if Sydney Sweeney wants to do commercials nude, that’s not my business. If she wants that to be her brand, all the power to her. My issue comes in when she plays the dumb woman card and makes it look like women cannot understand sports.
Sweeney’s act sets back women in sports by like ten years. We need to create another women’s professional league just to gain the footing back we lost because of this. Deep sigh. Sometimes it is hard to put into words the frustration and disappointment in how women, especially women in athletic circles, are treated. -Hana Grace
A set back for women in sports
Sweeney’s act sets back women in sports by like ten years. We need to create another women’s professional league just to gain the footing back we lost because of this.
Deep sigh. Sometimes it is hard to put into words the frustration and disappointment in how women, especially women in athletic circles, are treated. It is 2026, like, come on y’all!
Women’s sports are criminally underfunded, women are overlooked, and if we do get the opportunity to play professional sports, it is overtly sexualized. Don’t believe me?
Here are some very depressing facts!
There is a 99% pay gap between the WNBA and the NBA. An average WNBA salary is $585-600,000 while the average NBA salary is $12.6 million.
Called the Langrie football league, there was a legitimate league where women would play football in shoulderpads and underwear. Thankfully, the league disbanded in 2023, but when the Western Women’s Canadian Football League exists and has amazing athletes, why is it that women in underwear playing football is seen as something that is needed?
I have been working in the athletic sphere since 2021 and I have truly seen it all. Sure, the environment is slowly getting more welcoming to women in athletics, but some places are still just an old boys club.
Luckily, my current employers are amazing and I also am very lucky to have amazing women in the industry that I can call when I need some guidance.
It’s all the little things behind the scenes, like the way we eat, recover, sleep, train that get us to how we succeed on the ice, for example, and her ad doesn’t show anything of that. It also doesn’t show what most female athletes’ bodies look like. -Callie Hillhorst, defensemen for U of R’s Cougars team
The Real Deal
Being a woman in sport is not easy. Growing up, when a guy found out I liked sports, the first response was always (and to this day), ‘well name five players’ or ‘name five rules.’ I have been called names, I have been quizzed, I have been looked down on, and I have been passed over, but I love my job and will keep doing it despite these things.
It is not just me who feels like this advertisement sets us back. Callie Hillhorst, a defensemen for the University of Regina’s women Cougar’s team, agrees that the Sweeney ad was in poor taste.
“It’s very disrespectful towards women in sport because we put so much time, effort, and heart into our sports and her ad sexualizes us and doesn’t show anything to what we put into the sport to perform the way we do,” said Hillhorst. “It’s all the little things behind the scenes like the way we eat, recover, sleep, train that get us to how we succeed on the ice, for example, and her ad doesn’t show anything of that. It also doesn’t show what most female athletes’ bodies look like.”
Sweeney’s advertisement shows what a very small demographic of women look like. Furthermore, most female athletes are built like actual athletes. Look at Ilona Maher, an American rugby superstar – she’s built strong.
I think the most disappointing thing, above all the previously listed reasons, is that Sweeney trained to be an MMA fighter. She knows the struggles of maintaining an athletic figure and strengthening your body. Yet, a paycheque was more important than reminding young women that they can be strong and athletic.
I wish we could just move on from the idea that women can’t know sports. It’s a tired argument that doesn’t hold up anymore. Women have every right to be in athletic spaces and, frankly, I’ve seen tougher hits in women’s hockey than men’s.
So, women are more than a blonde repeating “sports.”
