Peloton holiday ad triggers snowflake meltdown

This week, the Internet exploded in furor over a holiday ad for the luxury stationary bike company Peloton. Critics mocked and hate-tweeted the ad mercilessly, calling it “sexist,” “mysogynistic,” and “a male fantasy.” Many condemned Peloton for “body-shaming” women and criticized Peloton customers for their “unchecked privilege.”

Peloton’s stock tumbled after the ad went viral. Shares dropped more than 10 percent by Wednesday, erasing more than $1 billion in market value.

What in the hell did the evil bastards at Peloton do to spark such moral outrage? Let’s see for ourselves.

The Peloton ad that melted a million snowflakes

Peloton’s ad opens with an attractive young mother (played by actress Monica Ruiz) wearing a big smile and a blindfold as her daughter leads her down the stairs on Christmas morning.

“Are you ready?” asks the off-screen husband. “Now!”

The blindfold comes off and the woman’s expression transforms to surprise and excitement. She gasps and exclaims, “A Peloton!”

Next, we see scenes of the woman using her Peloton and video-documenting her exercise journey on her smartphone.

“Five days in a row! Are you surprised? I am!” she says with a smile.

After another workout: “That was totally worth it.”

During one workout, an on-screen Peloton instructor encourages the woman by name. “Let’s go, Grace from Boston!”

“She just said my name,” Grace laughs through her exertion.

Finally, we cut to a scene of Grace and her gift-giving husband watching her v-log together on the couch.

On screen, Grace is looking almost tearfully into the camera and saying, “A year ago, I didn’t realize how much this would change me.” Then, perhaps a bit too sentimentally, “Thank you.”

The voiceover: “This holiday, give the gift of Peloton.”

It’s outrageous, all right

No, not this Peloton ad. I’m talking about the reaction to it.

Literally thousands of people took to Twitter to twist this Peloton ad into a diabolical plot to demean and enslave women. But the outrage was not merely confined to Internet trolls and virtue-signaling attention seekers. Oh, no. The media got in on it, too.

At CNN, snowflake journalist Scottie Andrew (yes, that’s his real name) did his best to portray the Peloton ad in a menacing light. In describing the moment when Grace removes her blindfold and gasps, “A Peloton!” Andrew wonders without a hint of irony whether the woman’s “shriek” is one of “delight or fear.”

To any right-minded viewer, Grace’s happy expression and excited bob are unmistakable—Grace loves the Peloton, and likely asked for one.

Yet amazingly, Andrew suggests it was the husband’s idea and that the poor woman is riding and recording the v-doc against her will.

“She records it all, though her large, doe-like eyes seem to plead those of us watching at home for help. Who is making her vlog after all?”

Buzzfeed too did its best to convince readers that Grace never asked for a Peloton, and as a bonus, dropped these glittering jewels of multi-faceted stupidity:

“Sitting atop her $2,245 Peloton exercise bike, a petite brunette woman wears a smile on her lips but an SOS signal in her eyes.

“I’m a little nervous…but excited,’ she says to her phone camera in an ad that people online have said doesn’t look unlike a hostage video.”

The New York Post had this to say (in an article titled, “Peloton responds to commercial backlash: People actually love our ‘sexist’ ad”):

“Peloton has responded to the avalanche of criticism it received over its cringe-worthy commercial, The Gift That Gives Back.

“In the ad, an already slender woman (whom the internet is clamoring to identify) receives a Peloton stationary bike for Christmas from her seemingly image-obsessed husband. She documents a grueling transformation over the course of a year, slaving away on the bike with its cult-favorite instructional videos.

“She plays the video compilation to her smug husband, tearfully claiming, ‘A year ago, I didn’t realize how much this would change me.’ The gift that is given back, presumably, is an even more slender wife for what appears to be a creepily controlling husband, critics observed.”

See what Post writer Lauren Steussy did there? Grace is “slender,” which for some reason really bothers Steussy; her husband is “smug” and “image-obsessed”; and the woman’s forced exercise is “grueling” rather than empowering or invigorating.

No wonder people don’t trust the media anymore.

Peloton responds

To my surprise, Peloton is standing by its commercial.

“We constantly hear from our members how their lives have been meaningfully and positively impacted after purchasing or being gifted a Peloton Bike or Tread, often in ways that surprise them,” the company said in a statement.

“Our holiday spot was created to celebrate that fitness and wellness journey. While we’re disappointed in how some have misinterpreted this commercial, we are encouraged by—and grateful for—the outpouring of support we’ve received from those who understand what we were trying to communicate,” the statement read.

Peloton included with its response emails it had received from people who supported the ad. (Images courtesy of CNBC.)

Below: A Facebook post in support of the Peloton ad.

Reporting on the Peloton response, CNN unsurprisingly attempted to fan the flames further in a Thursday headline that blared: “Peloton says you ‘misinterpreted’ its much-maligned holiday ad.”

But of course.

The “Peloton Wife” actress responds

In December, actress Monica Ruiz appeared on the TODAY show to discuss the ad and the controversy.

“Honestly, I think it was just my face,” she said. “My eyebrows look, like, worried, I guess. People were like, ‘She looks scared.'”

Ruiz went on to say that she’d had an “amazing experience” shooting the commercial.

Doesn’t sound to me like she thought she was involved in anything nefarious.

I won’t even address the criticism that Peloton’s customers are privileged, as this is the utterly predictable result after years of political messaging designed to foment class warfare among Americans. What, is Peloton the only company not allowed to advertise its products to the people who make up its target market?

For crying out loud. There is nothing wrong with this Peloton ad (apart, perhaps, from some overwrought writing and acting).

For me, the biggest disappointment here is how deeply grievance and outrage culture have become ingrained in our society. If you are a man, or a white man, or a slender woman, or you are generally happy with your life, or if you are someone who works hard and has money to spend, you are an oppressor. The enemy. Everyone else is a victim. We’ve become so addicted to being offended that people are seeing boogeymen literally everywhere, including this ad.

Seriously, people, get a grip.

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What do you think of Peloton’s “The Gift That Gives Back” holiday ad? Is the backlash warranted? Share your thoughts below.

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