Emily Guedes had no intention of becoming the centre of a social-media firestorm when she attended a Vancouver Whitecaps’ soccer game with two friends earlier this season.
Footage of the three young women cheering in the stands at B.C .Place Stadium was used in a promo video posted on the team’s YouTube and Instagram accounts on Wednesday. The video proved popular online and Guedes, a Port Moody resident, drew comparisons to former Baywatch star Pamela Anderson, who was discovered at a B.C. Lions’ game 25 years ago.
In the slow-motion video, Guedes — wearing a white tank top and holding a beer — jumps with her arms extended in the air as she follows the action on the field.
The team pulled the video within hours of it being posted after some fans complained it was sexist and misogynistic in nature.
“It was never our intention to offend anybody. It was just one of a series of eight videos we are using to promote our upcoming season-ticket campaign,” Whitecaps president Bobby Lenarduzzi said Wednesday. “The fact that because there were people offended, we just thought the right thing to do was to pull it.”
Guedes, meanwhile, is incredulous to the idea that there is anything misogynistic contained in the 18-second slow-motion video of her cheering on her favourite team.
“What’s misogynistic is the fact that men are in the videos — and kids cheering for (the Whitecaps) — but not a couple of women,” Guedes said. “I am not offended by the video but (I am) adamantly offended by their removal of it.”
Guedes isn’t an actress or model. She’s a season-ticket holder who goes to every game.
The idea behind the Whitecaps’ video campaign was to feature actual fans at actual games. All of the videos were shot in slow-motion.
“Nothing was contrived there,” said Lenarduzzi, who expressed regret that Guedes and her friends have been innocently caught up in a controversy. “It was never our intention to offend people by putting that video up and we didn’t want to offend her by pulling it down. It’s a bit of an unfortunate sequence of events.”
It’s not the first time the Whitecaps have been accused of sexist marketing.
In 2011, the club’s inaugural season in Major League Soccer, the Whitecaps received criticism for an ad campaign that featured a model clad only in body paint and a strategically-placed scarf.
Guedes, who was shown the video by a member of the Whitecaps’ marketing team before it was posted online, says she doesn’t feel exploited and is surprised by the attention she’s received.
"People need to lighten up. The only people who have a right to be offended by (the video) are me and my friends — and none of us are offended.
“I’m thinking about wearing an oversized turtleneck to the next game,” she joked.
