Sydney Sweeney’s critics are missing what her latest ad is really selling

The real threat is a predatory sports-gambling industry driving addiction and financial ruin among young men

Actress Sydney Sweeney has been in the news for a series of racy ads promoting a sports-gambling platform.

Much of the controversy has centred on the fact that Sweeney appears nearly nude, covered only by strategically placed sports equipment. The visuals have prompted criticism from female athletes who feel they are being objectified through the ads.

Others feel the criticism of Sweeney is hypocrisy on the part of the athletes, pointing to past scantily clad sports magazine covers and promotional photos of female athletes.

Both arguments make the mistake of forgetting Sweeney’s ads are not about sports. They are ads about sports gambling.

The company running the ads is Novig, a prediction-market website. Sweeney, who reportedly owns an equity stake in Novig, is an actress with a platform, and she is using that platform to promote a harmful product whose customers are disproportionately men.

In 2024, Ontario restricted sports-gambling ads featuring athletes and celebrities likely to appeal to minors due to situations like this one. The province was responding to harms that followed its decision to open online gambling to private operators in 2022. It was a good move, and one we hope more jurisdictions will follow. But it is the bare minimum needed to protect consumers from a product designed to keep them betting.

Men are about three times as likely as women to bet on sports, according to Statistics Canada data. The industry knows its audience. Its advertisements combine male celebrities, sports loyalties, sexual imagery, and promises of easy money to reach young men already struggling to find stable work, build savings, and establish families.

Cardus’s analysis of iGaming Ontario data found that the average active online-gambling account lost $283 per month in fiscal year 2023–24. That is more than three times the amount an average Ontario household could gamble while remaining within the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction’s lower-risk guideline of one per cent of pretax household income.

People who exceed that guideline are about four times more likely to experience financial, relational, psychological, and health harms. Those statistics describe unpaid bills, depleted savings, credit card debt, depression, substance abuse, damaged marriages, and families forced to absorb the consequences. A recently published Ontario study found that emergency department visits for gambling disorders rose 31 per cent after gambling liberalization, with the increase occurring among men rather than women.

The effects on young men of expanding gambling access are already visible. Since Ontario opened its private market, gambling-related contacts to mental health and addictions helplines among boys and men aged 15 to 24 have risen dramatically. A generation that should be learning how to work, save, and take responsibility is instead being lured by the siren’s song to gamble away money they don’t have.

Sports broadcasts are helping to deliver that invitation. One study found 2.8 gambling references for every minute of an Ontario sports broadcast. Children now encounter betting promotions as part of watching hockey or basketball with their families. Before they can legally place a wager, they are being taught to understand sports through odds, parlays, and betting apps.

Alberta had the benefit of Ontario’s experience before opening its own private online-gambling market. Yet it still permits sports-betting advertising and in-game wagers, which enable near-continuous betting and make a sportsbook resemble a slot machine. Its “responsible gambling” slogans are feeble protection against advertisements designed to encourage more spending.

Both provinces should prohibit sports-betting ads, or at least ban them from shortly before a game until shortly after it ends. In-game bets should be banned. Warnings should plainly describe the risks. Gambling companies and Crown agencies should fund independent research, prevention, and treatment, with contributions tied to their marketing spending.

Governments should also separate gambling proceeds from general revenue. A province that depends on gambling losses to fund public spending has acquired an interest in keeping its citizens betting, including the young men most likely to suffer.

We can debate Sweeney’s ad, but let’s not forget what is happening to men and boys in the online gambling industry itself. Pro athletes should be as upset about what these businesses, with the cooperation of governments, teams, broadcast partners, and celebrity influencers, are doing to their fans.

Renze Nauta is Director of the Work and Economics Program at Cardus. He holds degrees in economics and philosophy.