Sydney Sweeney is Ruining Feminism
Sydney Sweeney at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. Photo by Josh Popov via Wikimedia Commons
Most people know actress Sydney Sweeney for her performance in the show “Euphoria.” Her character, Cassie Howard, roughly navigates her high school whilst being sexualized by her peers.
In the most recent season, Cassie takes control of her sexuality, creating adult content after high school and using her physical appearance to make money. Fans questioned this shift in her character arc, asking if she is sending out the right message to girls and women.
Outside the show, aspects of Sweeney’s role have seemingly seeped into her other professional outlets, where she has sexualized herself to sell products that are not even inherently sexual and often for the wrong audience.
On Sept. 9, the Novig sports trading app released a commercial featuring Sweeney nude, using sports equipment to cover her body. She is seen representing multiple different sports… and by representing, I mean switching out the football with a basketball to cover her genitals.
“Think you know sports?” Sweeney asks in the beginning of the advertisement. “Prove it. Novig is just sports. So they wanted to show just sports.”
The advertisement instead shows an attractive, highly sexual woman holding nothing but a sports ball covering her to grab the audience’s attention.
In a world where women are still told that they do not belong in certain fields, especially sports, you would think that Sweeney would want to give women the platform to show how highly successful women in sports are, right?
Except this advertisement was never about women. Novig CEO Jacob Fortinsky admitted they weren’t intending to portray female sports, but this just raises the concern of how women are represented in male-dominated fields and marketing.
The commercial reinforces outdated and misogynistic views back onto women that they are not built right for sports, that they don’t have the strength or physique to compete. And even if they do, women are then called too masculine.
Female athletes quickly called out Sweeney for the commercial.
“Sydney Sweeney, this is what women in sport look like,” said British sprinter Amy Hunt to BBC Sport after a race, citing her finishing time.
Sweeney appeared to respond to the backlash by posting photos of athletes nude for the ESPN Body Issue, including Serena Williams and Megan Rapinoe.
However, there is a stark difference between Sweeney and these women athletes. She is using her body to sell a product, while Williams and Rapinoe are highlighting the physiques that aided them in their success in sports.
This is not the first time Sweeney’s commercials have been seen as controversial and anti-women.
In August, Sweeney released a campaign for her lingerie brand, Syrn, in which she is seen in several different lingerie garments while baking in a kitchen, climbing on the table and eating the cake she made.
What kind of message is she trying to send to women? The campaign is intended to pull women into wanting to buy her product, except there is not a single element in the ad that applies to women. She is sexualizing herself for men, not for women.
Having the campaign on the set of a 1970s-era kitchen, where she is seen in little to no clothes baking, is not cute — it is appalling.
This is yet another example of Sweeney setting women back after decades of fighting for rights and proving to the world that we are more than our bodies.
She has the platform to do so much good for women and young girls, to prove to society that we are so much more than looks and sexuality, that we can compete in sports and have strong bodies. She could even just help women feel confident in their skin and want to wear something they feel beautiful in.
Except she hasn’t. And audiences are starting to believe she never will.