#Passtheball: Stasis Theory at Work

Everyone's favorite talk show host (and person in general) Ellen DeGeneres is known for using her celebrity status to not only give away a ton of free stuff, but also to promote gender equality and LGBTQ+ rights. Her most recent crusade for gender equality is the #Passtheball campaign, in which she joins other celebrities including Zendaya and David Beckham to bring attention to the National Women's Soccer League. The ad is attention-grabbing and moves fluidly as a soccer ball is passed from celebrity to celebrity, each with their own unique reason for promoting women's rights. Although the commercial's tone of female empowerment seems pretty clear, the overarching message of soccer and gender equality is a little more complex. Thus, the commercial uses stasis theory to break down the relationship between gender equality and women's soccer.

This commercial's major argument is that in supporting the National Women's Soccer League, you will in turn support gender equality. The commercial uses the "evaluation and value" stasis theory in which a cause's ethical value is established in order to persuade an audience to support it. This is especially evident when Ellen begins the commercial by saying that the athletes "are great role models for our girls." By establishing the usefulness of the athlete, Ellen argues that the #Passtheball campaign promotes female empowerment, in turn establishing a correlation between the National Women's Soccer League and gender equality. The value of the campaign is further expounded as each celebrity states their reason for supporting the campaign. By saying that they support it for their daughters or their mothers, the celebrities maintain that the campaign is something necessary for their family. Thus, the celebrities highly value #Passtheball which, besides making a great case for ethos, ultimately confirms the major argument.