Larry Brown Sports

NBC removed a video from its website after receiving criticism for the way the video appears to objectify women.

The video (seen above) is entitled “Bodies in Motion,” and it mostly focuses on specific female body parts. Unsuspecting viewers are greeted with a compilation of clips depicting female athletes often bouncing around in slow motion, with the shots frequently focusing on the women’s backsides and chests.

The tone for the video is set in the first few seconds when a track and field athlete (believed to be Jessica Ennis) is shown stripping off her pants. Couple that with a musical bed in the background more suited for a soft-core adult movie, and the result is a video that seems designed to leave males with their tongues wagging rather than celebrate the athletic prowess of women at the Olympics.

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NBC apologized for the timing of one of its commercials that featured a monkey on the Olympic rings. The commercial was promoting NBC’s upcoming sitcom “Animal Practice” and it aired immediately after Bob Costas discussed Gabby Douglas’ gold-medal winning effort in the women’s all-around gymnastics. You can see the awkward segue below:

The poorly-timed commercial received plenty of attention online, and NBC has apologized for it.

“Gabby Douglas’ gold medal performance last night was a historic and inspiring achievement,” NBC said in a statement to the Daily Mail on Friday.

“This spot promoting ‘Animal Practice,’ which has run three times previously, is one in a series with an Olympic theme which have been scheduled for maximum exposure. Certainly no offense was intended.”

It’s rather silly that NBC actually had to apologize for this. The commercial is for a show called ANIMAL PRACTICE and has been running throughout the Olympics. It’s a pure coincidence it aired at that moment and I don’t fault NBC at all. The network has made some mistakes for which they should be blamed, but this was not one of them.

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NBC has understandably been pounded for its tape-delayed coverage of the Olympics. The time difference between London and the U.S. has forced NBC to spare marquee events from live television coverage in favor of primetime coverage up to 12 hours after they took place, even though NBC and its family of networks is broadcasting all throughout the day when these events are already occurring. It’s such an impractical mess that even the peacock network has laughably jumped the gun on itself.

And now that many people are fully immersed in the Twitter age, where spoiler alerts are few and far between, it’s even harder than before to avoid having results ruined before they air. But you know who really doesn’t care if you haven’t seen anything on TV yet? Lolo Jones.

Here’s what the American Olympic hurdler tweeted Tuesday afternoon, apparently in response to some of her followers’ complaints after she spilled the beans on some yet-to-be-broadcast results:

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NBC has been roundly criticized for its insistence on airing most Olympics events on tape delay, and its refusal to broadcast events live backfired on Monday night.

The network was about to air the women’s 100m backstroke that took place earlier in the day in London, but a “TODAY” show promo (seen above) spoiled the outcome of the event for unwitting viewers.

The promo aired during a commercial break before NBC aired the race won by Missy Franklin.

“When you’re 17 years old and win your first gold medal, there’s nobody you’d rather share it with. We’re there when Missy Franklin and her parents reunite … a ‘TODAY’ exclusive … live, tomorrow,” the promo says.

Between the chatter on social media networks as well as other news outlets, NBC is making it difficult enough to avoid learning the outcome of events. They just proved how impractical it is to tape delay things. Maybe this will be the wake-up call it needs to make a change for the future, though based on the strong ratings the network is posting, it may not be inclined to change. At least NBC won’t be able to censor its critics on this one like it has in the past.

For the record, this is the second big “TODAY” show-related blunder in recent weeks.

H/T Deadspin, video via Guyism

Note: This post also appeared on Yardbarker’s Olympics blog Medal Detector

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