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The actor was explicitly asked about criticism that "white people shouldn’t joke about genetic superiority." Hot Topic 🔥 Full coverage and conversation on Politics Sydney Sweeney finally addressed the discourse surrounding her American Eagle jeans campaign. In July, Sydney's denim campaign, taglined, "Sydney Sweeney has great jeans" (a pun on "great genes"), drew mass criticism. In one ad, she said, “Genes are passed down from parent to offspring, often determining traits like eye color, personality, and even hair color. My jeans are blue." Some felt that the campaign came uncomfortably close to a "dog whistle," given the recent rise in prominent eugenicist thinking. Shortly after, it emerged that Sydney was indeed registered as a Republican as of June 2024. In a new interview with GQ, Sydney was asked about the reaction to the campaign. "I did a jean ad. I mean, the reaction definitely was a surprise, but I love jeans. All I wear are jeans. I’m literally in jeans and a T-shirt every day of my life," she replied. BuzzFeed TrendingHot Topic Let's chat about all things Politics See our Politics Discussions As for what it felt like to have both the president and vice president compliment the ad, Sydney replied, "It was surreal." When pressed on whether she felt "thankful" to have powerful people have her back in public, she continued, "I don’t think…. It’s not that I didn’t have that feeling, but I wasn’t thinking of it like that, of any of it. I kind of just put my phone away. I was filming every day. I’m filming Euphoria, so I’m working 16-hour days and I don’t really bring my phone on set, so I work and then I go home and I go to sleep. So I didn’t really see a lot of it." Right now, Sydney is promoting Christy, a biopic about former professional boxer Christy Martin that deals with domestic violence. When asked if she worries that people will avoid Christy because of what she might think on "certain issues," Sydney replied, "No. No, I think that if somebody is closed off because of something they read online to a powerful story like Christy, then I hope that something else can open their eyes to being open to art and being open to learning, and I’m not going to be affected by that." When asked whether she'd like to address the criticism that "white people shouldn’t joke about genetic superiority" in the current political climate, Sydney said, "I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear." Addressing reports of American Eagle's stock rising, she continued, "I was aware of the numbers as it was going. So when I saw all the headlines of in-store visits were down a certain percentage, none of it was true. It was all made up, but nobody could say anything because [the company was] in their quiet period. It was all just a lot of talk. And because I knew at the end of the day what that ad was for, and it was great jeans, it didn’t affect me one way or the other." You can read the full interview with GQ here.
