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During the Super Bowl telecast on Feb. 7 there will be an unforgettable halftime performance. Insiders say it features a grainy home video clip involving Elin Nordegren, a 5-iron, a sleeping Tiger Woods and two balls.
OK, that's not true. The actual Super Bowl XLIV halftime show will feature legendary rock band The Who singing the 1978 classic, "Who Are You?" and a brand-new version, "Where Are We?"
What is also true — and I'm not kidding about this — is that during the telecast, mixed in among all the hilarious, watch-my-wife-Susie-blow-beer-out-of-her-nose commercials, there may be a 30-second, anti-abortion ad from our very own Focus on the Family.
Really.
A Super Bowl spot on CBS and three 30-second slots during pregame coverage would cost Focus $4 million. Although, as I understand it, the conservative Christian organization known for its intelligent debate on social issues will get a 20 percent refund if it can prove that some of the Budweiser Clydesdales are gay. (Or, as Focus calls them, "a little light in the horseshoes.")
The Focus ad supposedly features the story of University of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow and his mother. Pam Tebow and her husband were Christian missionaries in the Philippines in the '80s, and during her pregnancy with Tim she developed amoebic dysentery. Doctors told her the strong drug they used to kill the infection had likely damaged the fetus, and they suggested an abortion. Pam refused. Tim was born healthy, won the Heisman Trophy in 2007, led Florida to the national championship a year ago and is a likely top draft pick in next spring's NFL draft.
Tim never conducts an interview without bringing up Jesus and thanking God for his success. (Personal note: I believe God and his son don't intervene in football games because they have more important things to do. Such as making damn sure Doug Bruce doesn't become our mayor in 2011.)
Focus isn't confirming anything about the ad, though it's not a secret inside the organization. Reached by phone Tuesday, Focus media relations director Gary Schneeberger said: "I decline comment. Let's just say that. I have nothing to say."
But then he added: "If there is a Super Bowl commercial from Focus on the Family, I guess you'll just have to wait and see it during the Super Bowl. I can say Tim Tebow does not appear in any Focus on the Family ad." Schneeberger didn't say anything about Tebow's mother.
A source says the new head of Focus, Jim Daly, spoke at an evangelical conference a few months ago and unveiled the Super Bowl ad plan. Then he begged for donations from like-minded organizations. According to the source, Daly was given about $3 million, and Focus dipped into its general fund for the other $1 million.
This, of course, will come as a surprise to the 150 or so Focus employees who were fired a few months ago, supposedly because of a steep decline in handouts from dwindling legions of followers. In 2008, some 200 workers were fired from the Christian organization just weeks before Christmas.
The ad still has to make it through CBS and the NFL, which is far from guaranteed; last year, NBC and the league decided just days before the game not to air a pro-life ad from a Catholic-based group, Fidelis. Some pro-choice commercials have also been nixed in the past. So CBS certainly could reject the ad as too controversial, allowing Focus to benefit from the exposure that would bring — without spending a penny.
There is precedent earlier in the decade, however, for pro-life Super Bowl ads. So we could get the $4 million, anti-abortion Focus ads joining Super Bowl lore, along with the Budweiser frogs and the beer commercial with a guy meeting his fiancée's mother, whose super-gigantic mom-behind (squeezed into red leather pants) wouldn't fit through his apartment door.
My all-time favorite Super Bowl ad was from monster.com a few years ago, a "Need a new job?" commercial that opened inside a posh, oak-paneled office with the gigantic mounted head of a moose on the wall over the boss' desk. The camera then panned out the door to the other side of the wall, with the rest of the moose standing on that worker's desk.
Thanks to our cash-starved Focus buddies in their gold-plated palace up on the hill, Colorado Springs once again might be seen by the rest of the country as, well, the other end of that moose.
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I'm gonna be honest here... my main concern has (remarkably!) very little to do with the actual anti-abortion message. I myself consider the issue of life v choice to be a bit of a wild card, and that the individual situation is a closer depiction of what should occur than the generalizations both sides use. But I digress.
My concern is that Focus on the Family, a group whose hate-thy-neighbors tactics have led to reinforcing the second-class status of anyone who isn't exactly in line with them, might end up being the one "advocacy" voice that CBS allows through. Focus on the Family, for those who aren't fully aware of their various voices, is the slightly more "rational" copy of the Westboro Baptist Church. They preach hatred against homosexuals, against people seeking abortion, against any non-Christians, and then in the following breath declare how Christians are persecuted in this world, how the old stereotypical WASPs are the ones who are discriminated against in this Brave New World.
As for those who say that they're just defending their freedom of religion, I have to remind you that *all* Americans have the same freedom of religion... and that is not code for "freedom to worship however you want, as long as it's our way", as most Christian organizations are convinced. If I were Muslim, if I were a Shinto Buddhist, if I were a pagan or a Wiccan, it shouldn't matter and I should have just as much freedom of religion (and freedom FROM religion) as anyone else in this country. I should have as much right to be who I am, live how I live, worship how I choose (or not worship, in the case of atheists), and speak my mind as I see fit.
And if you're a heterosexual Christian, you get just that. If you're not, you're oppressing them. Because minority has nothing to do with real numbers, it has to do with perception... and the current popular perception seems to be that Christianity does better in modern times if everyone plays the victim.
My apologies to any who, reading this, feel that I'm far from the mark. But if this doesn't hit the mark for you, look around... you *are* the minority.
Posted by Mychyl
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We must remember that we ALL have freedom of speech and freedom of religion. Just because someone has a social and ethical view that is different from yours does not make it okay to poke fun at it.
Those who do not agree with Pro-Life, need to check their attitudes because they are showing who they really are.
I commend people who are willing to share their view in a dignified, mature way whatever they believe. Love is the bottom line. We all need it and we all need to give it.
As Michael Jackson said, "Love will make a better world ...."
Posted by kathy2
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Wow. You guys are all super nuts. I'm pro-choice, but I'm not going to call anyone A Christo-fascist, nor do I think the ad induces hatred of women.
I don't normally take a stand on issues of speech, because I am a liberal who believes in the first amendment. My concern with this ad is the way CBS is willing to run it, but refuses to run other ads because they have a "no advocacy" policy. You either have a no advocacy policy, or you don't. But you can't bar other ads for this policy, and not this one. Pick a stance, stick to it.
Posted by LiberalChick
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Another Ad in contention, from a Gay Dating Site. Difference being that the website owners will actually pay their own money, and that they actually pay taxes on their profits.
By the way, hunting a man down and murdering him in Church is kind of a HUGE action of Hatred. Also Murder. One of God's top-ten No-no list. Since "pastor" Dobson makes money off selling the name of God, he should really learn some of the Rules that go along with it.
How strongly has Dobson condemned even the actions of the Cowardly Skulking Murderer Scott Roeder?
Posted by brotherjonah2
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On MSNBC with Morning Joe, he said stop crying and buy your own damn commercial...
I could not have said it better. Whats all the fuss? It does not fit the tolerating liberal agenda.......so warm and fuzzy creatures they are.
Posted by sksphreek
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