Sydney Sweeney has an ad for American Eagle, in which she simply buttons up a pair of genes in, I guess, a sultry way, while delivering a genetics lesson. It’s kind of a half-assed lesson.
Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color.
OK, but it implies a simplistic pattern of inheritance, and worse, uses the word “determining”. “Affects,” or “modulates,” or “contributes to” would be better — there are at least 16 critical genes behind eye color, with maybe 150 genes that can effect the expression of color. Eugenicists a century ago tried to claim that that it was regulated by a simple Mendelian dominant/recessive relationship of a few alleles, but that idea fell apart pretty fast. All you have to do is look at the range of colors in the human population to see it can’t be that simple. Anyone who has a basic understanding of genetics is going to see the flaws in that line.
I’m not going to try to guess how many genes are involved in “personality.” All of them? With a huge contribution from environment and experience.
But then the ad company makes it even worse.
“My jeans are blue,” Sweeney concludes, with the ad delivering the now-infamous line, “Sydney Sweeney has ‘good jeans.’”
Oh god, are they like 12? Conflating ‘jeans’ with ‘genes’ is one of the oldest ‘jokes’ around — I teach genetics, and that word game is so tired and weak, especially since there aren’t even any good jokes built around it (if you know of any, tell me in the comments and I’ll judge the quality of your humor.) I groaned when I heard it. It doesn’t even rise to the level of a dad joke.
This, I thought, is the level of understanding the American public has of genetics.
I guess when I teach genetics this Spring I’m going to have to flop down on the floor with my shirt unbuttoned and slowly fasten up my pants. That’ll get their attention.
I’ve never gotten any jeans handed down from my parents. Does that mean I’m adopted?
we have come so far from the 1981 calvin klein ad with 15 year old Brooke Shields saying “You want to know what comes in between me and my Calvins? Nothing.”
Yeah, that whole ad campaign is just silly and badly thought out. They’re selling NEW clothes, so why imply they’re like something that’s “passed down from parents to offspring?”
Then again, equating “jeans” with “genes” has been a problem in the entire “designer jeans” craze all the way back to the ’80s. “Designer jeans” were only designed for people with the “best” “genes” — i.e., the most “beautiful people” who would make their jeans look best.
You’re not supposed to think about this too much, just imagine an attractive young WHITE woman with her clothes half off while you buy your jeans. Their “Syd Pick” jeans run about $50-$60 each currently. Better hurry, tho, because Trump tariffs are kicking in so those jeans could go up to $100 a pair over night.
I’m suddenly reminded of the joke my high school biology teacher told us: Diarrhea is genetic, as it runs in your jeans.
What do schoolchildren change into during playtime?
Recessive jeans.
Those are terrible. I warned you that I’d judge you.
Doesn’t genetic research require unfastening the genes?
But doing that homophonically in front of your students could get you arrested.
They can get worse. Bell bottom genes are responsible for buttocks that are a-pealing. Ok I’ll stop now.
I suppose the marketing team is trying to replicate the 80s era ‘controversy’ when Calvin Klein ran ads featuring a half naked, underaged (15?) Brook Shields provocatively claiming that “Nothing comes between me and my Calvins.”
I had never heard of Ms Sweeney as I rarely watch the dreck that passes for American television or movies.
When I looked her up I was surprised to read that “Liberals are losing their minds over a poor innocent jeans ad.”
Really? I doubt it’s liberals who made an ad that smacks of white supremacy with a soupçon of creepy old pedophile.
Odd how those two traits are commonly expressed in gross wealthy white men.
Genetics classrooms should show the satire video made about that ad by the Daily Show, in which the sexy young thing buttoning up their jeans is just Ronnie Cheng.
So I take it it wasn’t intentional when you did it yourself in your first paragraph?
Well…. when I was 11 or 12 and didn’t understand the concept of genes I was rather fond of “Arnold Roth’s Crazy Book of Science” that had a cartoon of the the two type of genes dominant (I can’t remember the cartoon– I think these blobbing genes where bullying and picking fights with poodles or something) and recessive genes which depicted blobs singing sad songs and crying while playing guitars and someone comments “blue genes”. I didn’t get it and asked my mother to explain and she was a astonished I had never heard of genes or genetics.
So no, I doubt that that will be deemed an worthwhile version of the joke but as it was the first time I heard the joke I’m going to claim I am allowed to like it and think it was funny… at the time.
This book was the first time I had ever heard of the word MITOSIS and there was a cartoon of a “very stupid frog” say “Help! Help! Mi-tos-is stuck together!” which still cracks me up when I think of it.
I tried to care about this ad and what went wrong with it.
I don’t care one way or another.
I’m not even sure what a few people find that is insulting about it.
Saying Sydney Sweeney has good genes is an opinion, not a fact.
In the biological meaning of “good genes” we would have to see how many viable offspring Ms. Sweeney leaves behind.
So far she is 27 and has zero children.
She has time until 45 years old comes for her.
To be fair, the fact that she can earn a lot of money with her talents and appearance is a good start. She has the survival part of “good genes” down at least.
And, so what?
We have so many major problems facing us these days that an ad that will come and go isn’t even on the list of things to worry about.
My parents and grandparents saved everything. I have in fact received as hand-me-downs for my own use some no-name jeans from my dad, and a very very old levi’s jeans-jacket from my grandfather. At the time, I was small enough.
I remember being disallowed into some premises 1980s because I was wearing jeans. My mate was also wearing jeans, but he was not disallowed.
Obs, we didn’t go there, but that’s when I was informed that there are ‘jeans’ (functionally equivalent, but the wrong brand/style/fashion) and there are ‘jeans’.
And that’s about as much as I know about fashion.
(Brand name price multiplier never ever made any sense to me; but then I like functionality, not fashion)
—
Never heard of her before this, and I lack any interest in her.
“Sydney Bernice Sweeney is an American actress and producer. She gained early recognition for her roles in Everything Sucks!, The Handmaid’s Tale, and Sharp Objects.” (Wikipedia)
Meh.
I had heard a little of this controversy and didn’t know how much to read into it. PZ’s quote of the reductive genocentic determinism coupled with good jeans/genes is a bit offputting. I don’t know that I would join in the dogpile. Is it racist? It’s a bit of vague allusion to positive eugenics if you squint real hard but not outright calling for sterilization. Wearing jeans way too tight in the nethers might take care of that (ouch).
I think I heard of Sydney Sweeney before. The bathwater infused soap person? No stranger to controversy I see. A least Miley Cyrus went big with an actual wrecking ball. Madonna derivatives.
Shades of Kiss?:
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/blood-money/
Gilda Radner (on SNL) did the ultimate send up of jeans commercials: “uptight” “guaranteed to ride up”. That’s all I am going to allude to on that. Probably didn’t age well.
Back in the day:
Well this Sydney Sweeney commercial isn’t quite as bad:
https://youtube.com/shorts/QjNWC3w-224?si=uGD8ObA_AnvY-U_k
It’s apparently a 65ish Mustang GT-350 which might be a Shelby with a tiny 289? Mustangs are passé, but why not a GT-500 with the monster motor? I’d prefer a Hemi ‘Cuda or pretty much any Barracuda over a Mustang. Yuck!
But apparently she’s quite the gearhead (respect):
https://www.the-sun.com/motors/11598685/sydney-sweeney-vintage-car-collection-garage-mechanic/
If she keeps at it she could surpass Jay Leno, but that’s too obsessive and excessive. She should do some JDM work.
Genetics – finding use for junk genes!
Live Science
Ancient viruses embedded in our DNA help switch genes on and off, study finds
.https://www.livescience.com/health/genetics/ancient-viruses-embedded-in-our-dna-help-switch-genes-on-and-off-study-finds
birgerjohansson @21
Alas more hype trying to sound the death knell of junk DNA. This scare quoting of “junk DNA” intro should have stuck to the “could play” part I highlight: “A new study has revealed that “junk DNA” descended from ancient viruses could play a key role in controlling genes.” and backed off the “junk DNA” part. Then the author switches to “DNA that humans acquired from ancient viruses plays a key role in switching parts of our genetic code on and off, a new study has found.” Interesting shift.
Is this generalization true?: “For decades after TEs were discovered, scientists assumed they served no useful purpose — that they were “junk” DNA.”
Oh this is funny: “TEs were deemed “junk” because they seemed irrelevant to the creation of proteins — the molecules that build cells and keep them running. While genes carry blueprints for proteins, these repetitive, transposable elements had long been dismissed as “nonfunctional” DNA.”
Jesus FC. Does this person realize the distinction between coding and noncoding genes and that benighted scientists are already aware of this?
The Waldorf muppet has already addressed how this paper has been misinterpreted:
https://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2025/07/endogenous-retrovirus-sequences-can-be.html
As Larry Moran points out from the get go:
“A recent paper on characterizing endogenous retrovirus sequences has attracted some attention because of a press release from Kyoto University that focused on refuting junk DNA. But it turns out that there’s no mention of junk DNA in the published paper.”
You can do a keyword search on the actual research article yourself for “junk” and turn up empty handed:
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.ads9164
As Moran says: “This is a complicated paper full of details and retrovirus jargon. It’s not of much interest to the average person unless you are passionate about the various MER11 subfamilies or the number of degenerate LTRs that retain the characteristics of retrovirus promoters. The authors isolated many of the promoter regions and showed that they still retain promoter activity in a reporter gene assay but this is not surprising.”
And: “It’s unfortunate that the authors refer to all of these sites as regulatory sites and note that they are active in some tissues. It’s not clear whether they think of these as true regulatory sites that have a biological function or whether they recognize that many of them are nonfunctional. There’s no discussion of spurious transcription or junk DNA/RNA.”
Full stop! I’ll be getting my analyses of key research and resulting anti-junk press hype from biochemist Larry Moran and not “Ben Turner is a U.K. based staff writer at Live Science. He covers physics and astronomy, among other topics like tech and climate change. He graduated from University College London with a degree in particle physics before training as a journalist.”
Hemidactylus@22–
To be fair to the journalists in this case, there are plenty of scientists who have acted like they’ve overturned the concept of junk DNA (see the ENCODE group, for instance), presumably because it makes good copy and garners attention.
Hemidactylus@22,
Also,
doesn’t appear to be a co-author of the paper. I kept looking for the actual paper Ben Turner was talking about, since it obviously couldn’t be “A phylogenetic approach uncovers cryptic endogenous retrovirus subfamilies in the primate lineage”!
KG @24
Hmmm…Turner apparently confused media contact for ASHBi Hiromi Nakao-Inoue with study co-author Fumitaka Inoue. See:
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1091012
Interestingly Fumitaka Inoue has “Best poster award (Runner-up), ENCODE consortium meeting (2018)” from: https://ashbi.kyoto-u.ac.jp/member/fumitaka-inoue/
Both are listed here:
https://ashbi.kyoto-u.ac.jp/people/
Hiromi Nakao-Inoue is a neuroscientist. I don’t know if the Inoues are related.
What TF? From website of Inoue lab @ASHBi
https://sites.google.com/view/inouelabwebsite/home
“In our genome, only 1.5% of DNA encodes for proteins and 98% is non-coding, of which function is unknown.”
I always feel I am being gaslit when people are explaining non-coding DNA and conflating it with junk DNA. It’s like there are these…ummm…noncoding genes that explode that.
I think I figured out the intent behind the Sydney Sweeney burns tires in a Shelby GT-350 spot. Watching an Eb&Flow video featuring a debate on Breaking Points this revealing quote surfaces from an American Eagle exec referring to the ad campaign as an “iconic takeover of the sphere- a true moment of brand strength” from: https://parade.com/news/american-eagle-exec-responds-to-sydney-sweeney-great-jeans-controversy
A takeover in a classic Mustang? Everyone knows you need a G35 (aka Skyline) for a proper “takeover”:
As I said above Sweeney needs to try JDM! G35s have bad reps for this behavior which fits the offputting nature of the ad campaign American Eagle may have sought.
Or maybe I was making a naughty pun on “takeover” since jeans/genes has been overdone already.
I work in a 7th grade classroom, and we use Punnett squares to explain the very BASICS of genes and inheritance. There’s always a student of two who asks. “but what about x?” and we tell them, yes, you are correct, its a lot more complicated. What we are showing you 12 and 13 year olds are the very basics, you’ll learn more when you get to high school, and even more if you choose to pursue biology in college.