Edit: Sabrina Pandora of TQ Nation has a different perspective on this commercial which you can read at REWARDS WHERE DUE on their WordPress. Quite a few trans people are considering this commercial to be a good thing, so I figured it was important to show that they have perspectives on this too.
The commercials during the Super Bowl were pretty crappy this year, but somewhere between the pre-game show and kick-off this commercial came on and I immediately had to rewind the DVR because it confused the hell out of me. It took me a while and a little talking with others to finally decide whether I was okay with it or not... and the answer, spoiler alert, is "no."
The reason it's so confusing to me is because when it comes to trans people in advertising, I'm used to it being so over-the-top, usually throwing in the emasculation of a cis man for the "lol gae" factor, but this one is so subtle that it could easily pass for being pro-trans if it were created for a pro-trans audience. After all, we have a trans woman who uses the service to "blossom" from a manly man into a woman. So objectively speaking, I don't think it's offensive at all, and I would actually consider it a relatively positive portrayal.
What we need to remember though is that it wasn't created for a trans audience, it was created for a generally cis audience. When seeing things through the eyes of advertisers, that's pretty much the Super Bowl demographic, right? So although objectively I don't consider it offensive, I am also painfully aware that somehow this was supposed to be a laugh at trans peoples' expense for cis people. Cis people tend to interpret these kinds of jokes as "harmless fun," because I mean it's not like someone beat her up, right? There wasn't even an outright gay joke! It's "positive!"
Can we really call anything like this "positive" or "harmless" while trans people are so ruthlessly bullied, assaulted, and murdered though? Even trans positive cis people have not earned the right to use trans humor responsibly, and I strongly doubt they ever will. And yeah, I know cis people get pissy when I say that because there's this ridiculous idea that messages always mean the same thing whoever says them. As trans people, though, we know that that's just not true. When will advertisers realize the same?
