McHomo – How McDonald’s Won Big With Their Super Bowl Ad

February 14, 2023
TOMMY

McDonald's* Super Bowl Ad "Knowing Their Order" was a sweet and clever concept: when you love someone, and the two of you love McDonald's, you know each other's orders by heart. To show this, they highlight a handful of everyday couples, plus Cardi B and Offset. One of those everyday couples just happened to be a super cute gay couple.

What was so wonderful was that the couple was simply another couple, no different than anyone else. They were featured for an appropriate amount of time, their legs are pressed against each other while they hold each other's hand, and their gayness wasn't the angle in the commercial. They were just... there, and that was enough. At the end of the spot, one of the guys says to the other, "Knowing their order is a sign of loving them" and their boyfriend is visibly so proud of him for coming up with that little line. It was wonderful, and it was also a moment where McDonald's essentially gave the $7 million commercial's logline to the gay couple.

It's both easy and justified in 2023 for people to bemoan the corporatization of things like Pride Parades. Now that it's cool to be Queer, we've got Pride Parade(TM), brought to you by Michelob Ultra, and packed with companies that continue to donate to anti-LGBTQ+ legislators. But this isn't that. In a capitalist and mass-media society, one thing reigns supreme: exposure. And in this Super Bowl commercial, simple and graceful exposure was demonstrated by McDonald's and I'm lovin' it. And for what it's worth, the company scores a 100 on the HRC's Equality Index.

If you missed the spot during Sunday's game, here it is:

* McDonald's has an apostrophe since it's possessive, but McDonald's is also a single corporation that can have its own possession over something like a commercial. But McDonald's ends with an 's' so is the possessive form of McDonald's... McDonald's' ??? #ImportantQuestions

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