Here’s now sinister this ad is: I must have watched it six or seven times before I thought, “Hey…wait a minute!”
The male “bad date” in the ad is so disgusting a viewer is half-hoping the woman pulls out a .44 and shoots him right between the eyes. This is masterful manipulation at work…he begins with an insult framed as blame causing him disappointment: “You’re too short.” Asshole. Then he reveals his narcicissm and boastfulness, showing the selfie “by the dumbbells.” Giant asshole! Next the air-drumming comment…UNBELIEVABLE asshole! When he gets to the bit about forgetting his wallet and “Sugarmamma,” the viewer is seeing red, and feeling that the victim of this toxic creep is being noble by just sneaking out rather than setting him on fire.
But she isn’t. She’s being an asshole too, just a slightly better one. Leaving the table on false pretenses to escape is cowardly and indefensible. Moreover, someone who misbehaves as outrageously as the “bad date” needs to be told just clearly how unacceptable his conduct is and why, since he obviously doesn’t know. His next victim will at least partially be the runaway date’s fault.
The commercial also showed an anti-female bias by making the bad date a male and his victim female. A genders switched version would inspire at least a substantial reaction from viewers of “What a weenie! The jerk doesn’t have the guts to confront that jerk!” But teh woman in the ad is also a weenie—it’s just that the Hyundai marketers are calculating that running away from confrontations and unpleasant situations is a girl thing, and socially acceptable.
No, it really isn’t. This is not only a stereotype, it’s a damaging one. Why haven’t we elected a female President yet? Accumulated cultural poison like this commercial is one of the reasons.
Incidentally, I hope that actor who plays the asshole was well paid for his performance, because he may end up dying single and alone as a result.
Ethics Alarms 
BAD BOB: “I think that’s wrong on it’s face, but if society were to embrace that sort of thing, wouldn’t we have to do away with a few ethical concepts? Loyalty comes to mind, the Golden rule, and I’m sure quite a few others would need definitions changed?”
None of the above. I had the benefit, at 18, of being put in charge of a staff that included a 60 year old grandmother. Gina was weird; proudly Christian, and professionally raided in Guild Wars…. Which isn’t per se a contradiction in terms, but was kind of unique. I loved our conversations.
One of which I remember talking to her about how people, even back then, had sex before marriage, and how she didn’t understand how any relationship could have trust unless two virgins found themselves for the first time.
The answer, to me, was obvious: Why wouldn’t you trust them? Where’s the lie? Now… She was thoughtful enough to lean back and have a think on that, because that’s who she was, and didn’t necessarily like it, or agree with it, but she accepted the truth of it: There’s no betrayal if there’s no lie.
There are cultural differences in play here, and realities that people your age grew up with are fundamentally different now, and it’s hard to wrap your head around them.
Religious beliefs, at least pre-Lutheran, tended to evolve over time to fit the realities of life: At the times the food prohibitions were active, those foods were almost as likely to make you ill as to nourish you, and by the time Jesus told the masses they could suck back pork and shellfish without sin, sanitation improvements had made those foods relatively safe.
We aren’t living in times where humanity or the faith teeters on the brink of extinction from external existential threats. It’s not important, and in fact, it’s probably not great, for the average family to have ten kids anymore. Sex doesn’t carry the risk of pregnancy that it used to. Sexual disease is significantly less common and much more preventable and treatable. I honestly wonder if, had condoms and penicillin been discovered before the printing press, whether the teachings of Jesus wouldn’t have broadly laxed the sex laws.