Comments on The Joy of Eating

Been awhile since I saw a turtleneck on an ad... Also this woman needs to finish chewing before smiling for a photo. My mother taught me this early on.

yes. i'm sure she's quite delicious.

She needs to learn to take more than one fucking bite.

GOD THAT IS FUCKING SICK!! And I was debating about going to the gym after work: now the debate is over, I am going to work out tonight. And increase my weekly running from 33 miles to 40 miles.

She looks like she's trying to win some kind of bar bet. What are those in her mouth? Billiard balls?

That ad definitely belongs in the Big Book of "What were they thinking!?"

It's a very midwestern picture and Sara Lee is a very midwestern company. It's no worse than those gross Johnsville Brat commercials. The woman in this ad will go on to live in a dilapidated subdivision, grow a really big butt, have six obese children, drive a beat up old safari mini van, and have a husband that wear yellowed undershirts around the house. That is what happens to girls who stuff their faces with hot dogs in the midwest.

In one word: NO. In two words: HELL NO. In three words: THAT'S EFFING DESPICABLE.

In Atlanta, these ads are on billboards. She's bigger than your car!

i think that's semen in the corners of her mouth...

I agree with you, Dan. Yuck! Ph, and poor girl, this ad is probably her "Big Break".

Seems like a good ad to me. Your diet should only include a tiny quantity of Sara Lee products. But when you finally get to eat some, you should enjoy the fuck out of it. I think part of our culture's obesity problem is the fact that you can't ever just slam an entire cupcake in your mouth and giggle. You have to hide and apologize and feel guilty, so you don't get to really enjoy it, so you never really satisfy your craving.

I think this is evident in the comments to this post: "Oh my God! She's...eating! Eeeew."

Who cares what she's doing? She's HOT.

This is simply a throwback to a time when we didn't hate our food and stuffing our children like pinatas was a universally recognized expression of love. Sheesh!

It makes me mentally review the Heimlich technique. That's just not safe!

No, it is just weird. The problem isn't 'oh no, she's eating' but 'damn, gross way to literally stuff your face and deform it'
Though I admit to a fat bias...

I think it's cute. Wow you people have ISSUES.

This reminds me of the reaction to a chicklit novel in which the hero shows his love for the plus-size heroine by giving her lots of Krispy Kremes, which her anorexic mother had been denying her. Some readers pointed out that a guy who gets off on his girlfriend's eating might have the sort of kink that will make him resist her losing weight (Dan noted this phenomenon in the Gluttony chapter of Skipping Toward Gomorrah). I thought this was a stupid overreaction, as the female character is depicted as healthy, just overweight.

Anyway. I don't find this ad a turnoff, but I also find Sara Lee to fail the "Frenchwomen Don't Get Fat" test: not high enough quality to be worth the calories.

This is always better than the original catchphrase:

Eat it, Fattie! ...EAT IT!!


FOOD IS YOUR MISTRESS NOW!

Cato the Younger Younger @ 4,

Dude, you run over 33 miles a week? That's intense. I run 4 days a week at about 7.5 mph for about 3.5 miles each day and a total 14 miles per week. I can do 8 mph, but it's a bit of a stretch.

How long/fast do you run? Any suggestions for increasing my endurance/distance? I seem to have plateaued.

Does this mouthful of cupcakes make my face look fat?

I can't tell from the photo...is the snack cake going down or on its way back up?

I agree. She needs to act like a normal model and throw up a lot, so that the skinny models of the world fear her.

Not.

@20, Well you start by putting one foot in front of the other and repeat several times...

Seriously though: To increase your mileage SLOW DOWN! Allow yourself to run distance runs (like 6 or 7 mile runs at an 8 minute pace or slower). And break up the distances you run as well. This week I have had one day off, one day was a 7 mile run, then the next day a 5 mile run, then a 4 mile run then today was a 7 mile run. Saturday will be 5 then 7 on Sunday.

The key is variety in distance and SLOW DOWN. (many runners go far to fast when trying to do distance and injure themselves or just die of exhaustion) You will notice after a couple of weeks your endurance will increase but remember to monitor your heart rate as well. I also run when I get up at 4:30am after my double shot espresso which means I get my run done before my body knows what hit it. :)

Chubby Bunny! Am i the only one that remembers that game from summer camp?

Don't let your imagination get carried away, it's completely innocent.

This is a lot tamer and tasteful than just about any Hardees commercial I've seen (probably Carl Jr's to y'all). I want to practically turn vegan every time I see one of their ads depicting somebody eating a greasy burger with the sauce dripping all over their mouths. Yummm.

I think she's sexy as hell.

In downtown Vegas, the Binion's marquee has been showing (for several years now) a clip of some hottie cramming a fried Twinkie down her gullet and laughing gleefully with her mouth full. In direct opposition to enticing me in to try one of the treats (hey, maybe the hotty's still in there cramming her gullett!), the clip actually repels me. I haven't been in Binion's since they started running this horrendous abomination. It's saying something, because there's almost nothing too nasty for Vegas to put up that will repel repeat business, but there it is.

Were you not slogging about an anorexic woman on Broadway last week? And now you're horrified by this joyous and somewhat mischievous woman with cheeks full of snack cake? Why do you hate women so much, Dan?

Chubby bunny innocent?!? That game kills, CHILDREN.

Chubby bunny, not even once.

Frankly it appeals to my hedonistic sensibilities.

Have you tried playing My Sims on the Wii? My fave is the bunny girl and the bee girl. The bee girl runs the ice cream shop.

thats what my boss looks like. all the time.

You'd have to be a gay man to find this unattractive. Or my mom.

No, you don't have to be a gay man to think that's gross.
That's totally discusting. I'm with Dan, it makes me never want to eat Sara Lee again.

@17

Get your own tame and unprovocative moniker, mooch, and stop cramping my style.

Totally gorgeous. And a great non-cooler-than-thou fuck off to food obsessed (I'm talking both ends of the scales) lunatics. Food, good, eat and enjoy. Then go do something active. Sara Lee I'd pass on personally but not cos I think I'm better than someone.
Oh, and I've got something I'd like to fill her mouth with.

Hey, I said I had food issues and a fatphobia. That's why I wanted to check with you all, to see if it was disgusting or it was just me. Seems like folks are coming down on the disgusting side.

That makes me horny!

hmmmm; I'd say she looks like a cross of Bjork and Brando as Vito Corleone...I find that to be strangely arousing.

Cover the lower half of her face, and she is cute, for sure. It's not about her being cute or attractive. It's about the message.
"Hey you, fatty! Buys shitloads of this stuff, go home, shove it in your SaraLeeHole and still look cute."
That message shouldn't appeal to anyone, but it does.

@33 - your boss looks like the bee girl in the Ice Cream Shoppe?

Cool!

I have fat phobia, too, Dan. But she's not fat - so let her eat! Seriously, if you can put me in touch with this woman...I love her. I know Josh does too because we always like the same women.

I'm coming down on the disgusting side. I'm not sure if it's because of piggy-girl rudely just cramming it in, or because I find anything associated with Sara Lee, Little Debbie, Hostess or the like to be awful by default.

I would probably see this as really cute if the ad featured a 9-year-old girl. But with an adult, it's just offensive.

"The Joy of Eating?" No. Not in this case. First of all, any sort of "snack cake" is just vile. They're loaded with unbelievable amounts of fat and calories, and they're not even tasty enough to make their consumption remotely justifiable. A great piece of cheesecake or the perfect oatmeal cookie might be, but not a pastry that came out of a supermarket freezer or off the shelf of your local gas station.

Second, "Joy of Eating" would suggest taking the time to savor the experience of something really good. Hell, at least TASTING your food--but certainly not compulsively shoving it all in at once so that you can't even chew or fully close your mouth.

Food issues aside, I find this kind of flagrant display of hedonism irksome because it, along with things like "My Sweet Sixteen" and the existence of the civilian Hummer, is the reason why America fully deserved to be attacked by terrorists.

I wonder, would an ad such as this even exist in Canada?