President Obama’s campaign took a page out of Vladimir Putin’s playbook and released an ad appealing to young women that is one extended double-entendre juxtaposing first-time voting with the loss of virginity.
Weirdly, the ad’s attempt to encourage teenagers to vote ends up implicitly mocking young women who decline to have sex with “a really great guy.”
“Your first time shouldn’t be with just anybody. You want to do it with a great guy,” Lena Dunham says, setting the motif of the video from the outset. She continue along this vein throughout, including this one mocking line.
As Dunham puts it, “It’s super uncool to be out and about and someone says ‘did you vote?’ and [you reply] ‘no, I didn’t feel — I wasn’t ready.’”
If a girl’s not ready, she’s not ready. The president, who has two daughters, surely understands that and probably wouldn’t have released this ad if he weren’t having a hard time while asking voters for four more years in the White House.
Starting on Election Day, Obama may have to live with the fact that no means no.
