A number of conservative bloggers are terribly disturbed by an ad that shows a wife who wants to please her husband. Stephen Kruiser wrote in his post titled Cops Should Do a Wellness Check on Woman in Peloton Christmas Ad:

A quick respite from the political news slog has been delivered unto us from the most unlikely of places. Peloton — the indoor workout bike that runs around fourteen and a half million dollars — has released a Christmas with a creep factor so high that it has people reaching across the aisle in agreement about its awfulness. … This fictional frightened woman’s yearlong journey to lose the 14 ounces of water weight that her husband the good Doctor Mengele insists she musts is the Christmas miracle that a news-weary world needs.

Kruiser’s reaction comes after reading Allapundit’s post on the ad:

The weird part is the … eagerness with which she shows her gratitude. It’s lovely to be grateful for an expensive gift, but she’s *really* grateful and *really, really* wants her husband to know it. It’s not just that she feels compelled to record herself using the bike repeatedly over a span of many months. She looks curiously anxious doing it, even when smiling into the camera. At the end of the clip, when she finally shows him the footage, her eyes are trained on his reaction, seemingly desperate for his approval. Is, um… How do I put this? Is everything okay between these two? I feel like there’s a lost scene here right after he gives her the bike where he grabs her by the throat and growls, “And you’d better use it.” Real “Sleeping With the Enemy” vibe in her excessive need to please.

Stephen Green linked to Kruiser’s post with the note:

I just watched the ad, and the creep factor is off the charts.

What I find disturbing is that none of these men can imagine a wife wanting to please her husband, and feeling grateful for a much loved (not to mention expensive) gift. I don’t know a kind way to put this, but I don’t think they understand what they are giving away here. It is fully natural for a woman to want to look good for her man, and to yearn to please him. When it happens it is a truly beautiful thing for both the man and the woman. This isn’t to say that there aren’t some hard bitten ugly feminists who would never deign to please any man, but that such a woman is far more of a twisted outlier than these men can fathom. This also isn’t to say that even in excellent marriages the wife will always be intent on pleasing her husband. But what these men see as twisted is a truly wonderful thing when it occurs, for both the husband and the wife.

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