The Halloween ad for Twix, manufactured by Mars Foods establishes a new assault on American democracy, using venal and unscrupulous private corporations to do the government’s bidding. Rod Dreher, who is often too far Right for me but spot on in this case, writes of the jaw-dropping ad (yes, I find it offensive, and also scary in a non-Halloween way),
This is an aspect of the weird totalitarianism we are living through today. We have seen harder manifestations in cases where physicians, academics, and others lose their jobs for questioning transgender ideology. Things like the Twix ad cannot be understood as apart from the overall message discipline of the Left: that there is only one permissible opinion to hold, and those who do not hold it are enemies to be crushed.
This is not a one-off, and it is not neutral. The inability of normal people to understand what is happening here is one reason why this garbage is so effective at changing the way people think.
Bingo. The ad is a tool of totalitarianism. “Weird” is too mild a word for it, indeed a poor word, because it diminishes the significance of what this represents. It represents the indoctrination of children. The ad is an implied threat. It declares that anyone who does not agree with the State is evil, and will be punished, even killed. It is sickness presenting itself as virtue.
I guess it’s time to show the ad. As Samuel Jackson says in “Jurassic Park,” “Hold on to your butts!”
Dreher’s summary is fair:
What is the message of this two-minute clip? That genderfluidity is right and good, and opposing it is what wicked bullies do. That a child struggling with gender dysphoria can turn to the occult for assistance, and to smite his enemies. God made them male and female, says the Bible, but the power of the occult can be accessed to overturn that bigotry.
This radical message, embedded in a humorous ad for Halloween candy.
I think the ad is worse than that. It suggests that violence, even death, is an appropriate punishment for bullies in general, and those who question the the encouragement of gender confusion specifically. The child is portrayed as having no supervision or guidance from the parents, who have apparently delegated their authority to the “nanny”—a metaphor for the State, perhaps. Worst of all, the ad intentionally presents a political statement under the thin guise of a candy commercial, when it has nothing to say about the candy at all. It might as well be a campaign ad for Terry McAuliffe.
I hate boycotts, but I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that companies that side with the political and social bullies need to he punished, hard, and if we can make them disappear to teach other potential corporate allies of the speech and thought police that acting like this is not good for the bottom line, then so be it. Mars owns a lot of brands (some are shown above), and many that my family uses. It even owns the veterinary clinic where we care for Spuds, and they do a wonderful job there. I am reluctant to compromise my dog’s health because some asshole in a marketing departments decided that selling gender-transitioning to pre-teens was an appropriate way to sell Halloween candy. The ad, and the trend it represents, demand a strong response, however, and complaining on a blog currently read by 12 erudite people won’t do it. This isn’t trivial, even though Twix is (I hate Twix). It is sinister. More Dreher:
Let there be no “candy for the sake of candy.” Every aspect of life must be infused with revolutionary consciousness. The propaganda war must be waged without hesitation. That’s the idea. To play your role, you need to say, “Oh, come on, what’s the big deal? It’s just an ad for candy!” And to play my role, I have to publish things like this blog post. I know that they are counting on reactionaries like me to do this, but what is the alternative? It’s a heads they win, tails we lose deal.
Soon we won’t even recognize our country anymore. Those who grew up in this propaganda world the Left has created will think that we who remember the Before Times are weird, and that little boys who wear dresses and turn to the occult to defend their sexual undifferentiation are the good guys.
I must say, because it is true, and because the reason companies get away with this offal is that principled opposition is so easily tarred as prejudice, that I have no objection to honest advocacy for pro-transsexual issues. These are difficult ethics issues, especially as they affect young children. However, I have substantial ethical objections to embedding propaganda for any position that is the subject of legitimate controversy in products marketing, as well as to demonizing particular views (and extolling others of dubious validity) in ads aimed at children.
Mars needs to be smitten itself.
Ethics Alarms 
Good Lord.
What did I just watch?
Had the reliably left wing shills not departed en masse, they’d be here to try to at least give this a less nefarious interpretation, and I’d love to hear it.
Because right now, my only response is apoplexy.
Glad we supervise what our kids watch.
This ad is clearly for left Twix. Maybe there’s another in the pipeline for right Twix?
You owe me a keyboard, and I’m furious that I didn’t think of that myself. It’s hard being amused and furious simultaneously, damn you!
Hah!
That “left Twix vs. right Twix” campaign is pretty darned clever, well done and memorable. Only bad aspect is it brings “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” and Roald Dahl to mind. Ugh.
That ad is terrible!!!
Don’t these people realize that they’re promoting “Brown Shirt” mentality to children in a candy commercial?
What was it that Hitler was quoted as saying, something like, “If you can indoctrinate them when they’re children, you’ll have them forever.”
He Alone, Who Owns The Youth, Gains The Future. A. Hitler
Dreher is falling into the Marxist, Bolshevik trap: “I know that they are counting on reactionaries like me to do this.”
“Reactionary” is the most facile, clever term ever dreamed up by the Bolsheviks and used by Marxists ever since. Anyone who doesn’t buy the Communist line is a reactionary, which means they are entirely illegitimate. In effect they’re saying, “If you don’t agree with me, you and your ideas are illegitimate.” It’s brilliant. It obliterates all opposition. The left today most often uses “conservative” or “Republican” in this manner. “Reactionary” is a little passe and involves a little historical context. But the bottom line is, the progressives, BLM, antifa, the Squad, the Justice Democrats, et al., are revolutionaries using the Marxist playbook to radically reconfigure (okay, revolutionize) America.
If I were ever accused of being a reactionary, I’d say, “You’re damned right, I’m a reactionary. I’m reacting to really, really bad ideas, which is the only proper response.”
I view this as a mom. I can’t help it.
Where are the parents?!?
As the mother of a straight son and a gay son, both of whom played dress up when they were young, I can assure you they did so because they were CHILDREN. They each outgrew it in time. They also both asked awkward, blunt questions out loud and in public. Each time I tried to use the moment as a teaching opportunity that, I hope, left both them and the person about whom they were inquiring with dignity in tact. It’s not terribly hard to do. This ad shouldn’t have been terribly hard to do.
I despise when corporations, late night talk show hosts, et al, pimp out children and then judge/ridicule them for behaving like children. It’s obscene.
I know it’s an ad, but I’d like to punch that millennial goth nanny in the throat.
Get in line…
Adults are no longer adults. Look at what happened at this Kentucky school! What is going on in the world? How did no adult stop this? There are no sexual ethics in public schools anymore, so I am not completely surprised. The marketing team for Twix probably wouldn’t have a problem with this either.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/student-staff-lap-dances-kentucky-high-school-lead-disciplinary-actions-n1282630?cid=sm_npd_nn_fb_ma&fbclid=IwAR0z9ZvsrknOhuGEGTYBbLe-6sfxuAS_fpLMRtb-dCP7c7Q8hVPudNwYrKo
Reminds me a little of the Duke lacrosse team controversy. I don’t remember ever reading or hearing anyone ask, “College guys are hiring strippers (some of color!) to entertain at their parties? Is this okay? Is this acceptable behavior by college guys? Is this a good idea?”
Sexual ethics are dead. The only limitation is don’t kill anyone, but otherwise, “you do you, boo.”
A child is too young to know if they are transgender. Suppressing puberty and all the rest is going to cause long-term damage to a group of children that are going to be mad as hell when they grow up and realize what’s happened.
This is the best Hersey’s commercial I’ve seen.
JP will be here all week, folks.
Tells one hilarious Left Twix, Right Twix joke and gets all judge like!! Just kidding of course.
Could one conclude that the lack of parental participation is a reason the child is dressing up? Not because he is questioning, and fine if he is, but because he knows it bothers his absent parent(s)?
I found JP’s comment particularly funny because my first reaction was, “Didn’t he mean Mars rather than Hershey’s?” Fooled me. But I guess JP could say, “Not Sorry!”
Sorry not sorry. I wish I could take credit for it, but I technically can’t. I saw in the comments section someone say, almost the exact something but instead of Hersey’s they said M&Ms. I don’t think they realized they were made by the same company.
“Not sorry” is Reese’s, which is Hershey. Mars makes M&Ms (guess what the “Ms” stand for…)
Ah this is why I’m a terrible writer. I did not think the person making the comment about M&Ms realized that it was made by the same company that made Twix.
On a different note, the ‘Not Sorry’ is something my wife often says to me with joking around. I didn’t realize it had anything to do with a candy commercial.
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Their entire commercial presence. I think Jack’s posted on how annoying he finds their campaign. And Reese’s is now a Hershey’s brand.
How would the message have come across if the kid wore rabbit ears everywhere? 3D glasses? A security blanket? A suit of armor? A tuxedo? To me the ad seems like wish fulfillment regarding people who are bullied for being different.
However, it also seems like it’s deliberately targeting a particular way of being different, and to me it comes off as pandering specifically because it’s wish fulfillment instead of taking the issue seriously. I would appreciate ad spots that encourage people to ask, “How would we hope people would treat this kid? How would we expect the kid to respond to people who are mean?”
However again, that seems like an issue that’s too serious and in-depth for a candy company to be picking up unless they want to make it part of their mission, which… I think most companies should avoid doing. Opinion follows: Companies by and large should provide a product or service and if people want to start institutions for social change, those entities should be separate and distinct from the ones that sell you regular essential or luxury goods and services. Candy is candy and should be politically neutral for all. It would be a huge mistake to make trick-or-treating a political exercise.
Maybe I’m wrong, and this commercial just helps young trans kids by letting them see themselves represented and acknowledged on mainstream TV. If it were me writing the commercial, though, I’d do that by just including them with the other kids instead of building the commercial around gender-based bullying.
“If it were me writing the commercial, though, I’d do that by just including them with the other kids instead of building the commercial around gender-based bullying.”
Exactly.
And who the hell runs a two minute TV commercial? And by the way, there are only white people in it? Is that permitted? Where are the obligatory scads of black people seen in every TV commercial?
It’s only sort of a commercial. It’s part of a series of Halloween shorts on Hulu, as I understand it, but they each have different and very obvious sponsors, so they basically function as commercials.
Thanks, Em. Getting Hulu is beyond my technical capabilities. So it’s really just lefty propaganda.
Cleary I have lived a sheltered life… could someone explain the “Twix” joke?
They had an ad campaign with left twix and right twix. I vaguely remember it but forget the exact details. Here’s one version:
Are you a Left Twix or a Right Twix person?
Nonsense. “Smite” is an irregular verb, of which the appropriate form of the verb is “smitten”.
When do you use “smote”?
Past tense, from what I can tell.
“I will smite them.”
“They ought to be smitten.”
“I just smote them.”
I’m convinced. I’ll fix it. A win for PM!
This may help.
Although some irregular verbs are sui generis and don’t line up with other things at all well, some actually form small families within which they are regular, though in a different way to other verbs. This is one such, with “smite” being regular with “write”, just as drive/strive/thrive is another such family (in fact, those two families have some regularity with each other, differing only in the last consonant of the root form). Just as familiarity with “drive” may help guide usage of the other members of its family, so also familiarity with “write” may help guide usage of “smite”. So, think when you would use “write”, “wrote”, or “written”, and follow that pattern with “smite”.
I did some digging, and in fairness to Twix, this wasn’t strictly meant to be an ad. It appears to be part of a collaboration with the Mars company and Freeform TV, where they slap the Twix name on a bunch of Halloween-themed short films. Here’s one that ALSO has no Twix bars in it, but no agenda either (aside from nightmare fuel): https://twitter.com/31Nights/status/1449752063940997123
That being said, this was still dumb virtue-signaling. At first I thought the bullying would be more severe (like physical assault) but nope, the witch just sends them flying for saying she and the boy are weird. The punishment didn’t exact fit the crime.
I also find it amusing that the witch was an attractive young woman, which undersells the “misfit” aspect I think they were going for. In real life the kids would likely be too busy gawking at the hot goth chick to harass the boy in the dress.
1. How do you know she was a young woman?
2. It’s still an ad. There’s no title, and the Twixt branding comes in immediately after. Vignettes having little or nothing to do with a product that are followed by a simple product ID is a standard marketing ploy.