CBS Executive Rejects Gay Dating Site, “Mancrunch”, Super Bowl Ad

by Tim Newcomb

Aristotle argued that to understand anything, observe its beginning and its development.

In 2004, executives at CBS rejected an ad from the United Church of Christ, which highlighted its acceptance of all who would worship with them, including gays and minorities.  Recently, CBS executives accepted a Super Bowl ad featuring Tim Tebow that advocates against abortion.   Soon after that, those same CBS executives rejected an ad from a dating site for gay men, despite having unsold spots remaining.  Would these same executives reject a similar ad from eHarmony?

“After reviewing the ad, which is entirely commercial in nature, our standards and practices department decided not to accept this particular spot,” CBS spokeswoman Shannon Jacobs said. “We are always open to working with a client on alternative submissions.”

To understand commercialized athletics today and why — of course — those CBS executives would reject a gay-friendly ad for the Super Bowl, the beginning and development to observe is commercialization itself, not sports.

The beginning and development of modern sports, as every historian knows, begins with the original Olympic Games which promoted aspects of combat from javelin and discus throwing to wrestling.  Whether Olympic contests or real life hand-to-hand lethal combat, the infamously sexually-interactive Spartan warriors were always the most powerful group to be reckoned with.   So an understanding of modern commercialized sports is not found in understanding the beginning and development of sports.

The beginning and development of modern commercialized sports, on the other hand, is a simple question – how to keep the most money coming in day after day?   If you are Jo Ann Ross, the CBS President of Ad Sales, and decide which ads to accept and which to reject, that question should drive all such decisions.  Which makes it curious, not that those CBS executives would reject a gay-friendly ad for an audience they assume is intolerantly homophobic, but that they would head CBS into Super Bowl issue advocacy advertising in the first place.

The Courtside Post reached out to John Amaechi, former NBA Center, who is openly Gay.  Amaechi, who authored “Man in the Middle” and is known as “the first NBA player to come out” – according to ESPN – said in a tweet to us, “a typical reaction (by CBS) – sex is fine on TV, so long as it’s hetero. Snickers homphobia 1; Manchrunch 0″

The reactions to Super Bowl issue advocacy will be more interesting to see than any ad it runs.