ManCrunch.com Spokesman on CBS: "It's a Blatant Case of Discrimination"

On Thursday it was reported that CBS was considering an ad from gay dating site ManCrunch.com for possible broadcast during the upcoming Super Bowl.

Now ManCrunch.com is charging that the network is discriminating against them in regards to their ad which shows two men watching the Super Bowl, accidentally touching hands and then kissing passionately. Spokesperson Dominic Friesen tells AfterElton.com the network is not treating them fairly.

Says Friesen, "There are two parts to the whole situation. After nearly two weeks, CBS broadcasting standards, which reviews Super Bowl ad submissions, has yet to approve or reject our Super Bowl ad. This is clearly a stall tactic. And in turn, they've been lying to us all along and telling us there is no ad space available for sale. And, as of three hours ago, our CBS sales rep told us the exact same thing."

This conflicts with reports by Fox News who says a representative for Pop Tarts told them that CBS had ad spaces still available. AfterElton.com contacted CBS and was told there were still possibly a few units available and that other advertisers were interested. 

CBS declined to comment on Friesen's charges, nor would a CBS spokseperson explain how the ad approval process works. The network's only official response was that the ManCrunch.com ad was still being considered.  

Friesen says ManCrunch.com isn't buying that. "It's an abnormal time frame and clearly they are hoping it would go away, but it's not. We really wanted to run this ad during the Super Bowl. We didn't think it would be problem. It's not inflammatory. It's kind of come out of left field that we're being discriminated against so heavily by CBS. We honestly did not anticipate this."

ManCrunch.com is a website most people are not familiar with and only launched this month. Super Bowl ads are notoriously expensive, but when asked if the start-up dating site actually has the the money for the ad, Friesen is emphatic that they do and are serious. 

"The ballpark figure is about $3 million. We went through a pre-approval process [with CBS] to prove we can actually pay for the ad and then the review process for the ad itself."

More than one commenter has suggested the controversy is a public relations ploy to generate publicity for ManCrunch.com, but Friesen says that isn't the case.

"Our dating obviously site targets gay men.The reason we chose the Super Bowl is that it has an audience of 90 million. It's primarily a male driven audience. We did budget in our overall marketing campaign for a Super Bowl ad. It made good marketing sense to reach that many men at one time. It's the only advertising venue to reach that many men. For us, we're getting more bang for our buck."

Friesen added, "This whole chain of events is a blatant case of discrimination. It's anti-gay by CBS and I think it's very indicative of where we really are in America right now. It really represents a lot of change that needs to be done right here."

Friesen provided AfterElton.com with the contact information for the sales representative working with ManCrunch.com, but the sales rep never responded to a request for comment. 

The network has been under scrutiny from many in the gay community ever since the network announced that they were accepting an anti-abortion ad from the anti-gay group Focus on the Family. After questions were raised how airing such an ad didn't violate the network's own policy against running advocacy ads, CBS announced they had revised their policy and would now accept advocacy ads.