Skepchick's Incongruous Ads

-

To get the big picture you have to include the ads.

When Rebecca Watson introduced the new look for the skepchick.org Website, a commenter observed that there was an empty column on the page which looked weird. Explaining what was causing the problem, Watson wrote: "Using Adblock on Skepchick makes the baby jesus cry."

So what kind of ads is Skepchick running? If you deactivate Adblock you'll be treated to such stuff like "Date 12000 Asian Women Online" and "ColumbianCupid.com." Both ads feature attractive young women posing for the guys, not really cheesecake shots but... (Click on image to enlarge.)


These ads popped up on a post by Watson about her being treated as a sex object, how someone sent a link to a very crude cartoon depiction of her. I don't condone the cartoon; I think it's gross and stupid. But I do find the ads that accompany her post to be incongruous, to say the least, when Watson complains about how are women are being treated by sexist men. After all, don't these ads objectify women?

A commenter to the post also pointed this out. In response another commenter said that these ads are based on someone's browsing history. Well, even if that is the case, skepchick should ban some of the ads, as one commenter mentions, or if that can't be done, just drop the ad service completely.

Skepchicks don't need the ad money that bad, do they, to set aside their principles?

After all, as one commenter stated: "I thought the Super Bowl commercials were particularly sexist and objectifying this year."

Baby Jesus must be crying.

Comments

Doug said…
Seems as though she should simply tout the ads as evidence justifying her complaints about objectification; "See, here's what I'm talking about." I suppose she'd be happy to get any revenue from the sexist visitors to her site who would click on those links, if there were any.

This reminds me why I don't run ads on my site. Not that they'd run contrary to my topics, but there's too much crap out there.
8:41 PM
X. Dell said…
Actually, one of the reasons why I never used AdSense was because I would have no control over what ads would appear. It could be that she draws the ads because of spam on her site that she hasn't cleaned up yet. Maybe there's some sort of tracking softwaare that checks for inclicks and outclicks--in that case, it would better reflect her audience.
9:50 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

-
Image
Jim Moseley: Flying Saucer Farewell I'll miss my late night phone conversations with Jim Moseley. Despite trying to track how he was doing in his fight against cancer I didn't hear the bad news until yesterday. Jim died on November 16, 2012. One of my regrets that I never had the opportunity to visit him in Key West and spend a day with him. Even though we never met in person, he was a friend. I mainly knew Jim as a voice on the phone -- and, of course, as the writer-editor of the zine Saucer Smear (and also as the author of postcards he sent to me marked PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL). Jim was around at the dawn of ufology -- or as the topic was called way back then, flying saucers. Parts of the field he couldn't accept, personalities way out there without anything real to back them up. For example, George Adamski. Jim was critical of "ufoology." Through his writings Jim made friends and enemies. His humor and tell-it-like-it-is attitude didn'
Read more
-
Image
Jesus Photo Jesus Christ died in 33 CE. French physicist Joseph Nicephore Niepce created the first known permanent photograph on metal in 1826 CE. Ergo, there are no photos of the living Jesus. But not when it comes to supernaturalism, especially of the New Age kind. After reading the non-fiction work When Prophecy Fails , I wanted to find out more about the people described in the book. Their names had been changed but with some Googling I discovered that the actual appellation of “Mrs. Marion Keech,” the leader of the doomsday flying saucer cult in the 1950s, was Dorothy Martin. After her prophecies failed in Chicago, Dorothy Martin moved on but kept channeling Jesus Christ – or the being whose real name, she believed, was Sananda. She ended up in South America, living in the Yucatan, with a new name: Sister Thedra. Jesus (AKA the Ascended Master Sananda) appeared to Thedra and cured her of terminal cancer. To prove that she hadn’t been dreaming, Jesus appeared in tangible form
Read more
-
Image
Fortean Three: North Country Odd Events They say bad things happen in a series of three. Looks like odd events can follow that pattern. Recently the North Country – the corner of New York State where I live, hinterlands bordered by Canada and Lake Champlain – has popped up in the news of the weird and extraordinary. Someone saw a black panther in the Lake Placid area. Not an indigenous critter in these parts. According to an article in the Lake Placid News dated 4/24/08, Tsermaa Plumley thought she heard a bear prowling around their property on Schaefer Road in Keene. Her husband Dan investigated to see what kind of animal was in the compost. They were surprised to see a large alien black cat (or ABC to use the Fortean abbreviation). The mysterious black panther left; no one was harmed, just startled. ( http://www.cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/placid-panther/ ) The day before (4/23/08) WPTZ-TV in Plattsburgh reported that a local student videotaped an UFO at night. Mysteriou
Read more