Beckham Puts the “Ick” back in… Oh, Just Forget It.

By: Laurie | December 14th, 2007

I spent several hours yesterday trying to finish this headline:

“This photo puts the ‘Ick’ back in…”

The only one I could come up with was the obvious anatomical one. (Oh, geez. Come on. You know. Rhymes with “best pickles.”) And believe it or not, even I am not that crude.

Wait. What are you laughing at?

Ladies and gentlemen, meet David Beckham. The new ~~face~~ whatever of Armani underwear. (I’m a boxers fan myself, and this photo reminds me of why that is. Because…well…ick. Some things are just better left to the imagination.)

The most humorous part of this photo is that it has caused quite a stir in England, with one Daily Mail columnist saying it epitomizes the fact that “Greedy, vulgar, tacky Beckham is narcissism made flesh… an icon for an age in which fame and fortune is all.”

Go in and read the article. It’s interesting, and a little bit of the analysis is spot-on. (Did I sound British there? Thanks. I tried.) It comes down to the big question: Why does he do stuff like this, exactly? It’s not as if he needs the money, and this photo is beyond tacky.

But on the other hand, it’s obvious that this woman has no familiarity with David Beckham beyond the stereotype, and especially obvious that she’s never seen him play.

As a sportsman, Beckham was always narcissistic, as famous for his hairstyles as his goals; more tantrums than talent.

I wasn’t a ManU fan back in the day, so I don’t know whether or not this was ever true. As a Galaxy fan, I know that it’s not true now. I have yet to see a tantrum. Quite the opposite. And I have no idea what drives Beckham to do these things, but the word “nascissistic” doesn’t quite capture it, and to say that it does is a gross oversimplification.

He is driven, certainly, and that drive takes him in odd directions. And he’s certainly materialistic, but I’ve always gotten the feeling that it’s because he’s been pulled that way more than because it’s his natural inclination. And he does love being famous and accepts it almost as his due.

And yet it’s frustrating for me to see him summed up this way. After a year of studying him, I’ve gotten the feeling he is, at heart, a decent person. That if he’d been pulled toward social awareness instead of materialism, he would have embraced it just as wholeheartedly. And there’s still a chance he may. He’s only 32.

But it is pretty humorous to seen him ripped apart by a British tabloid. Kind of like listening to Dr. Frankenstein carry on about what a horrible creature that monster is. Because what might Beckham be like if it not for the tabloids that created “Posh and Becks”?

But perhaps that’s a bit too deep for the Daily Mail.

Some Related Galaxy Posts:

Category: Off the Field, Player News

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Inara47

Hey, I love Becks and Posh news! If I wanted straight up reporting, I'd go to Reuters.

The way football is these days, what happens off the field is just as (if not more) interesting than what happens on the field. Because let's face it, if he weren't married to Posh but a nice, boring girl...well, he wouldn't be Becks, would he? And he'd still probably be on Alex Ferguson's good side. Then he never would have been a Galactico. Oh, and Posh was the one who wanted to move to LA! We in America would never have been able to call Beckham our own if it wasn't for his other half.
Laurie

Winrar, if we were all about football, we'd be just like the rest of the sites out there. The Offside tends to go for irreverence whenever possible. If any individual posts don't make you happy, there will be others coming along soon. We do cover more of the actual game during the season. This time of year the choices tend to be fluff or nothing.

The thing about Beckham is that he's larger than life. (No pun intended.) He wasn't brought in so much for his not inconsiderable on-field talents, but for his ability to generate publicity. He does this by doing things like this Armani thing. To ignore this side of him would be to cover only part of the story.
winrar

PS i do notice it off the field etc section... but still ... :rolleyes:
winrar

British tabloids are the only magazines that would do any crap around a pic like this. 1st mostly cause they like , 2ndly cause they like to write stuff about David and Victoria. B O R I N G... is that an actual place for such ninsense or is this place to READ about football.. ?
Laurie

:-)
Nick

kick?
Martha

Well, Freddie's are hot. That's a difference.
Inara47

I don't see how this is any less tacky than Freddy Ljungberg's Calvin Klein ad and the DC one with the Italians. Whoever said than underwear ads are supposed to be tacky is correct.
Eric Jasso

Why is my wife ignoring me after reading this?
Laurie

Symbiotic or parasitic? Or a little of both?

That Chabal video is hilarious. LOVE Chabal. But you knew that already. :-)
glatisant

The man is 32, so it's a bit silly to blame the tacky photos on Posh and the British media, imo. At this point the relationships are pretty much symbiotic.
That said, there's nothing that prevents one from being a model professional/decent person and an exhibitionist of embarrassing proportions at the same time, is there?

Completely O.T., but have you seen this yet, Laurie? I burst out laughing when I heard of it:
Cauet does it again
jenl

I'm not really crazy about this photo, but I can think of two reasons besides money that he wouldn't have a problem with it.

One, is that Posh absolutely adores this kind of look and publicity and likely encouraged this type of photo.

Two, is back to the speedos comment. I don't think it's THAT much of an issue in European advertising markets to shoot a photo like this.

With that said, I'd really much rather see him using that body on the field -- to me that is the most artistic use for his body.
Ana

Why do you think people call him Golden Balls?
:)
mag

and wanted to add that there are a lot of pics in internet from his holidays on the beach in 2005,2006 where he wears speedos as well. So nothing realy new this photo shows.
Melissa

If I was ever on the fence about being a boxers girl, this advertising campaign alone is the nail in the coffin for tighty whities.
mag

Yeh....the pic is a little tacky...but this is underwear advert so it's supposed to be "like that". Any way I personaly don't care what he is doing off pitch,he is the biggest heart player and the hardest worker.
Look what Capello said about him! If somebody like Fabio even mention you,it means a lot.
P.S. Man is going to earn 20 million for this advert,this is his hot time. I don't see anything bad in it.
Alex

speaking of becks, i found a interesting view of Becks coming to America

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Bella

p.s. I also hope he's young enough to exhibit more of a social conscience as he moves toward post-playing career plans. Certainly shows alarming flashes of intelligence when talking about working with kids -- and their varying needs.
Bella

COME on, there's boys reading, let's not malign testicles now. I'll always be with you on the create/destroy, build-up to tear down, tendencies of the British media (not to mention the FA and public), brought to a high art in Beckham's case. But there are some apples and oranges that can be sorted. Tantrums, none at ManU, Sir Alex doesn't have that even if a player were to be so inclined; lot's of hair-do's yes. Definitely no tantrums at Real Madrid, except maybe the cursing at the ref that featured first fluent use of Spanish (that's our boy!).\; but hair, speedos, the usual mix of brilliant and what the hell is he thinking fashion choices, yes.

He likes his body, as do most athletes able/happy to put one to good use in front of 100,000 screaming maniacs, maybe more (but maybe not, see Italian men's team undies ads, while in front of an airconditioner, which you have it posted someplace back when). If he's going to do ads and endorsements, he'd probably just as soon have some nice shots of the bod as appear dressed as a gladiator in a [soft drink] ad. Since he's not actually a gladiator but does in fact have a body, I say this is truth in advertising (and all you spending the last 24 hours debating whether that's a real weenie can just suspend disbelief for a moment -- and really wouldn't there have to be more stuff if there were stuffing?).

I would agree, he's a decent person (still has the same best friends he made as a teenager and kept the ones he's made on every team he's played on since then, which is reasonable enough testimony for me), I believe the football and family first thing, even the passion about whatever he's doing thing, I know he and Mrs do significantly more charity work and give away significantly more money than they publicize. But he clearly doesn't think its wrong to stockpile shoeboxes full of money. Certainly a bit of tarnish, but something I have to overlook in supporting any player on a team I follow other than the Galaxy.

BTW, never thanked you for the coming to America send-up. Hilarious!
Gord

This photo puts the 'Ick' back in ridiculous?
PLAYTHERAPY

Who knew botox could do-

THAT!!!

OWWWW, BET THE INJECTIONS HURRRTTT!
Martha

It's hard to find anyone to blame for his image other than him though, Laurie. I mean, he may be a wonderful person, but he certainly works very hard to make us focus on how he looks, doesn't he?