A Tofu Hummer

Vegetarians, men with self-confidence, and environmentalists have joked for years about men buying Hummers to make up for their small… well, you get the idea. Over the past several months, Hummer has released a new ad campaign that highlights and endorses this sentiment as a perfectly reasonable rationale for purchasing their behemoths.

It's stunning how enthusiastically the ad embraces this idea. The entire plot is based on it: A guy feels wimpy because another guy saw him buying tofu, so he dashes out and buys a Hummer to feel better about himself. The original tag line of the ad was in fact "Restore your manhood." Hart says people called in to complain ("The whole idea of manhood and virility is a touchy subject," she points out, "especially for men"), so, after two weeks on the air, the ad was recut with the line changed to the slightly more ambiguous "Restore the balance."

Check out the rest of Slate's article here.