Super Bowl Ads: When Diet Culture, Wellness Culture, & Capitalism Collide
Welcome, my friend. This little corner of this internet is where we talk about what it means to have a body in this world — through the lens of autonomy, compassion, and liberation.
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The Super Bowl is more than just a football game—it’s a cultural spectacle, a showcase of high-budget commercials that don’t just sell products but shape how we think about health, success, and self-worth. At $7-8 million for 30 seconds, these ads make it clear where the money—and the messaging—flows.
And nothing illustrates the contradictions of modern consumerism better than the back-to-back airing of two seemingly unrelated ads: one for Hims & Hers, a telehealth company promoting weight loss drugs, and another for Poppi, a “healthier” prebiotic soda.
At first glance, these ads seem to be sending opposing messages—one pushing weight loss medication, the other promoting a fun, gut-friendly beverage. But together, they highlight an exhausting cycle so many of us feel trapped in: shrink yourself, but don’t deprive yourself; consume, but consume correctly; be healthy, but don’t trust your own body to get you there. These ads don’t just sell products; they sell a belief system—one that keeps us fixated on our bodies, searching for the next solution, and never quite feeling like we’ve arrived.
Diet Culture: The Manufactured Problem
The Hims & Hers commercial, which is now facing backlash for its hypocrisy and misinformation, is a textbook example of diet culture repackaged for the modern era. The ad presents GLP-1 weight loss medications like Ozempic and Wegovy as a simple, accessible solution to a “problem” that we’ve been conditioned to believe needs solving.
For anyone who has struggled with body image or weight stigma, ads like this can feel deeply personal. And it's also more than understandable why folks feel drawn to these medications. Because in a system that profits from and perpetuates body shame, this is not about individual choices. The problem isn’t people choosing weight loss drugs; it’s the way companies exploit insecurities without full transparency.
What the ad conveniently leaves out is that the specific weight loss drug they were promoting—compounded semaglutide—has not been approved by the FDA. Instead of an honest discussion about risks, the ad framed it as a casual, effortless path to “self-improvement.” The vague wording and sleek marketing made it seem like a perfectly safe, doctor-approved option for anyone who wanted to lose weight. But experts were quick to point out that compounded semaglutide isn’t FDA-approved and may pose unknown risks.
This kind of misleading advertising is a hallmark of diet culture—promising fast, easy results while glossing over the potential consequences. It’s part of a long history of selling weight loss as a necessity, regardless of the physical, mental, or financial toll it takes on consumers. As someone with straight size privilege, I want to be absolutely clear that I'm not speaking to personal choice, as I believe in body autonomy. I'm saying people deserve full, honest information about their health choices—not marketing spin disguised as empowerment.
The deeper issue isn’t just one ad—it’s the relentless message that weight loss is always the goal, no matter the risks, the cost, or the toll on our well-being. It’s no wonder so many people feel pressured to pursue it. The real failure is the system that keeps telling us our worth is tied to our size in the first place.
Wellness Culture: The "Better" Solution
Just as the Hims & Hers ad plants the idea that your body isn’t good enough, the next ad rushes in with a different pitch—don’t cut things out, just consume them differently.
Enter Poppi, the self-proclaimed “soda for the modern age.” Unlike traditional soft drinks that revel in "indulgence," Poppi positions itself as a wellness-friendly alternative—lower in sugar, packed with prebiotics, and marketed as a way to “love your gut.” Its vibrant, influencer-backed branding doesn’t reject pleasure outright; it simply redirects it toward a more “acceptable” form. (Of note: Poppi is also facing backlash for its alleged $25,000 vending machines being sent to influencers). And to be clear, if you genuinely enjoy this soda, that's wonderful. This is not about preferences, it's about dismantling the morality around food choices.
The contrast between Hims & Hers and Poppi may have felt striking. The weight loss ad tells us that we should aspire to shrink (while also co-opting Black liberation rhetoric??), while the soda ad tells us we can enjoy things—but only in the healthy way. Poppi’s message isn’t about true enjoyment; it’s about tweaking consumption patterns to align with wellness culture’s moralized version of health.
This is where diet culture and wellness culture blur together. Traditional diet culture tells us to restrict; wellness culture tells us we don’t have to—but only if we make the “right” choices. Instead of outright telling us to eat less, wellness marketing frames it as “taking care of yourself.” But the underlying message is still control, just wrapped in prettier packaging.
And for so many of us, this is the exhausting tightrope we’ve been walking for years. We’re constantly told that our food choices carry moral weight, that our bodies need constant management, and that the only way to “do health” correctly is to follow the ever-shifting rules set by brands and influencers.
The wellness industry loves to distinguish itself from diet culture, claiming that it promotes "balance" rather than restriction. But at its core, it operates on the same principle: the belief that our bodies are problems to be managed. Instead of telling us to eat less, wellness culture tells us to eat better—but within the parameters it deems acceptable. And if those efforts don’t work? Well, diet culture is waiting right around the corner with its next solution.
Body-Based Capitalism: Selling the Problem and the Cure
The real brilliance (and cruelty) of these back-to-back commercials is how seamlessly they work together to keep us locked in an endless loop of consumerism. Hims & Hers sells the promise of weight loss; Poppi reassures us that we don’t have to give up all pleasure to achieve it. One encourages us to medicalize our bodies, while the other offers a wellness-friendly way to enjoy food in a “responsible” manner.
Together, they ensure that we remain preoccupied with managing, optimizing, and controlling our bodies—always buying, always striving, but never quite arriving at the health and happiness we’ve been promised.
This is capitalism at its finest: create the insecurity, sell the solution, repeat. The same industries that tell us to fear our weight are the ones profiting off weight loss medications, wellness products, and the idea that if we just find the right balance, we’ll finally feel at peace in our bodies.
But peace doesn’t come from constantly striving, constantly tweaking, constantly trying to get it just right.
A Compassionate Alternative: Self-Trust and Community
So where do we go from here? How do we navigate these messages without falling into their trap?
The answer isn’t in another product, another rule, another external validation. It’s in reconnecting with our own bodies, our own needs, our own intuition.
Instead of asking whether we’re making the “right” choices, we can start asking different questions:
What actually makes me feel good?
Do I even like this, or have I been told I should?
What happens when I trust myself instead of a brand to tell me what’s best?
The truth is, you don’t need to earn your right to enjoy food. You don’t need to chase an ideal that was never designed to make you feel whole. You don’t need to keep fixing something that was never broken. And ultimately, we need connection and community that reaffirms our wholeness and common humanity.
It’s okay to feel pulled by these messages. It’s okay if you’ve bought into them before—we all have, because that’s how they’re designed to work. But the most radical, compassionate thing we can do is step back, recognize the game for what it is, and remind ourselves that we don’t have to play it.
Super Bowl ads come and go, but the pressure they represent has been here for a long time. The good news? So has the choice to step out of the cycle. And you deserve the freedom to pause, to consider what matters to you, and to move forward in alignment with your values.
I'd love to hear from you on this.
Did you see these ads? What did you think?
Sending you compassion, my friends. Thank you so much for being here.