Feminists Don't Hate the Male Gaze and the AT&T Girl Just Proved It

It was funny to me. We spend a lot of time hearing feminists tell us that they aren't sex objects, that we need to rein in our desires as men, and begin seeing women as equals, not as baby factories or conquests. Yet, here is feminist #187542 telling men that sex is the reason we should be deciding things like who our world leaders are and how we should see our country governed. 

I'm noticing this is a constant pattern with feminists. The male gaze is evil... until it's useful. 

You may remember Malina Vayntrub, even if you don't remember her name. She was the charming AT&T spokesgirl, "Lily," with a pretty smile and huge... tracts of land. It was those assets of hers that caused the entirety of the internet to fawn over her like a corporate siren. However, Vayntrub saw this attention as evil and disgusting. In an interview with the New York Times in 2023, Vayntrub lamented the "leering internet trolls" that popped up as a result of her appearances on television. 

The New York Times begins this tale of woe thusly: 

A few months into the reprise, however, the tenor of Lily’s — and therefore Vayntrub’s — reception abruptly veered from benign tolerance to lecherous malevolence. In the summer of 2020, seemingly overnight, one small but vocal corner of the internet fixed its gaze upon Vayntrub and began referring to her by a new name: Mommy Milkers, a reference to her breasts.

This meme spread far and wide, and Vayntrub was subjected to a slew of internet comments that were disrespectful and even had nude deep-fakes distributed of her that obviously weren't real. I'm going to be the first to stand up and say that this is, indeed, awful. Not being able to go and see anything on the internet about yourself that doesn't involve crude references to your body has probably got to suck, especially if you're a woman. 

But the thing about Vayntrub is that she hasn't exactly kept her assets completely under wraps. The internet is filled to the brim with pictures of her wearing things that accentuate her cleavage and curves that she herself put out. If she was trying to avoid being looked at with any sort of lust, then why release those pictures? Who was that for? 

The answer is obvious. She's a good-looking woman with ample cleavage, and those kinds of assets make it easier for you to get work. The long-running truth about marketing is that sex sells, and Vayntrub was okay with that until she spent a summer being called "mommy milkers." Still, even in the NYT piece, she tells the interviewer that the benefits of working as AT&T's charming front-woman outweigh the negatives by "one hundred percent." 

Fast forward to today, and Vayntrub, the woman who loudly denounced the male gaze as evil and angrily demanded people stop seeing her as a sex object, is now asking you to activate your male gaze and start seeing her as a sex object. 

According to the New York Post, Vayntrub is releasing "tastefully risque" pictures of herself for charity to help those whose lives were devastated during the California wildfires: 

The actress and model, best known for her longtime role as “Lily” in commercials for the telecommunication company, teased potential donors that they would receive “flirty and tastefully risqué” photos of her — while she ruled out nudity.

Vanytrub began offering her “exclusive pictures” to people in exchange for their donations to a GoFundMe set up by Bridget Bradley, a single mom who lost her East Altadena home in the deadly Eaton wildfire in January.

The initial donation drive raised $170,000 in four days and helped Bradley, who has three children, including a then 5-year-old son with Cerebral Palsy, pay for a year of housing, medical expenses and a new car.

“Only Philanthropy trades exclusive content for real-world impact,” the company’s website states. “We raise money for urgent causes quickly, by offering our generous supporters something a little flirty, a little silly, and with a whole lot of heart.”

Even on the "Only Philanthropy" website, there's a tagline that says "Using the male gaze to fight the blaze." 

Say what now? 

For years, Vayntrub was one of the louder voices proclaiming the evils and personal tragedies that come with women being sexualized, but now she's literally asking us to sexualize her to help people? Don't get me wrong, I think the cause is fantastic, but how do you square that virtue signal with not actually having that virtue at all, without everyone not taking you seriously? 

How many women jumped on the man-hating bandwagon because of Vayntrub's lashing out at men and their "male gaze?" How much did her sophistry contribute to the ever-widening gap between men and women? 

Now she wants us to treat her in the way that she condemned us for? Again, we see that feminism isn't a principled ideology. Like most social justice causes, feminism is an ideology of opportunism. Things are evil until they're useful. 

It's my honest opinion that feminism doesn't hate the male gaze at all. In fact, I'd say that they actually love it, they just have to pretend not to because it gives them a sort of moral currency. The moment the benefits outweigh that virtue signal is the moment they drop all pretense and embrace the very thing they say they hated. Vayntrub, like the girl in the video at the beginning of this article, is just another opportunist disguising herself as a moralist. At the end of the day, she knows her body gets her ahead of the pack, and she's willing to use it when it benefits her. 

She's fine with being a sex object. That much is clear, and I think most feminists are too. 

I'm going to end with quoting myself from an article I wrote about the male gaze earlier this year: 

But here's the brutal truth about human nature: Women are sexual objects. 

Of course, it's not all they are to a man, but sex is a major component in the natural male/female dynamic. It's written so deeply into our DNA that both men and women do what they can to attract sexual attention from one another. Funny enough, for women, step one is attracting the male gaze. They want to be seen, noticed, and admired. They want to be pursued. 

That brings me to the second brutal truth about human nature: Men are sexual objects too. 

It's just not as talked about because the attraction to men is less physical and thus more easily disguised in polite company. That said, women are very apt to see men's physical attributes as good or bad, but oftentimes a woman's concerns gravitate around a man's ability to provide comfort, safety, and excess. A woman who finds a man attractive will actively begin the seduction process that will eventually have her in bed with him. 

And it all starts with getting him to look. 

I wish Vayntrub luck in her endeavor, but I'm not taking her or her feminist cohorts seriously about the male gaze ever again.