Callaway and Good Good turned violence against women into a punchline

Callaway’s disgusting advertisement with Good Good Golf wasn't an unfortunate joke that landed badly. It wasn't an innocent creative risk that a few overly sensitive viewers misunderstood. It was a multimillion-dollar company approving the image of a man shoving a woman to the ground to sell golf clubs.

That should never have survived the first pitch meeting, let alone every subsequent layer of production, review and corporate approval. In the now-deleted video, Good Good co-founder Garrett Clark pushes professional golfer and content creator Alexis Miestowski to the ground before yelling, “Do not touch my new driver.”

That was the joke. A woman touched a man’s possession, so he responded with violence. Hilarious.

The explanation that the video was intended as a parody of the horror film Obsession, as The Wall Street Journal reported, does not make it smarter or less repulsive. Parody doesn't erase the images a company deliberately chooses to recreate, especially when it removes the context, turns the violence into a product pitch and delivers the scene to an audience that might never recognize the source material.

The premise would have been idiotic and unpleasant even if Clark had shoved another man. But choosing a woman as the target gives the scene a much uglier meaning, whether the people responsible were perceptive enough to recognize it or not. Violence against women is not an abstract concept or a clever prop that can be deployed to make men laugh and sell equipment.

The most damning part of Callaway’s Good Good ad is that nobody stopped it

Callaway CEO Chip Brewer has now apologized, acknowledged that the company approved the video and promised changes to ensure something similar “never happens again.”

Sorry, but Callaway doesn't deserve credit for discovering, only after public outrage, that showing a man knocking a woman down was inappropriate. The important question isn't whether the company can write a carefully vetted apology, but rather how many people watched that video before publication and saw nothing disqualifying about it.

Nobody stopped it during the concept stage. Nobody stopped it during filming. Nobody stopped it during editing. Good Good approved it. Callaway approved it. They attached the companies' branding and published the ad for the world to see because an entire chain of people either failed to recognize the misogyny in front of them or recognized it and decided it was acceptable.

Both possibilities are damning.

Callaway’s response somehow made the controversy even worse

Then there's the response Katie Ginella received from someone she identified as working on Callaway’s social media team.

Ginella, who shared on TikTok that she has survived domestic violence, contacted the Callaway employee before Brewer’s extended apology. The reply read, “I think that people yelling that we are endorsing violence against women are just as irresponsible as the video.”

Callaway approved a branded advertisement in which a man shoved a woman to the ground, stood over her and threatened her. Yet someone on its own social-media team apparently decided that the people accurately describing those images were “just as irresponsible” as the company that helped produce and distribute them.

No. They were not remotely equivalent.

Callaway’s critics didn't create the violence. They didn't film it, edit it, approve it or use it to sell a golf club. They simply saw what Callaway placed in front of them — company-sanctioned imagery that trivialized violence against a woman — and refused to accept it quietly.

Describing those critics as “people yelling” is also revealing. It's the familiar language used to belittle women whenever they object too loudly to their own degradation: hysterical, dramatic, irresponsible, unable to take a joke. The problem, apparently, was not only that Callaway exercised atrocious judgment. It was also that women and their allies refused to be polite about it.

This exchange makes Brewer’s apology sound even more hollow. He says Callaway values women and opposes violence, but a member of its social-media operation reportedly responded to legitimate criticism with defensiveness, contempt and an absurd false equivalence. That's a cultural problem.

Brewer can personally review every advertisement Callaway produces from now until retirement. It will accomplish very little if the people beneath him continue viewing those offended by misogynistic content as equally culpable for the controversy.

Brewer also made sure to remind everyone that Callaway believes it has been “a positive force for diversity and inclusion in the game of golf.” But an apology is not a corporate balance sheet. Callaway doesn't get to offset an advertisement like this by pointing to all the good things it believes it has done elsewhere.

If anything, the claim makes the failure worse. Callaway says it understands inclusion, yet it helped distribute an ad that reduced a woman in golf to a physical punchline.

Golf keeps saying it wants women, but its culture keeps saying otherwise

Women already receive the message that golf — and sports in general — do not belong to them. They encounter men who question their knowledge, ability and right to occupy space on the course. They are patronized in pro shops, sexualized online and treated as outsiders in a sport whose culture still too often presents the male golfer as the default and everybody else as a guest.

Good Good’s apology was similarly inadequate, saying the video “ultimately depicted actions” inconsistent with its values. That is bloodless corporate language designed to avoid naming the offense. The video didn't mysteriously “depict actions.” Good Good conceived, produced and posted an advertisement in which its male co-founder shoved a female colleague to the ground. Callaway reviewed it and gave its approval. Say what happened. Own what happened.

The industry loves to congratulate itself for “growing the game.” Growing it for whom, exactly?

You can't credibly tell women they belong in golf and then do this. You can't preach inclusivity in corporate statements while your marketing does this. You can't separate the advertisement from the culture that produced and approved this.

The fact that Miestowski willingly participated in a staged video doesn't make the message harmless. Advertising is staged by definition. What matters is the behavior the companies chose to portray, package as entertainment and attach to their brands.

The PGA Tour, which will soon be connected to Good Good through a title-sponsored event, has also condemned the video. That can't be the end of its response though. If these organizations are serious about making golf welcoming to women, accountability must extend beyond deleting a post and waiting for the anger to pass.

Callaway should disclose what changes it is making, who possessed approval authority and how such an obviously repulsive concept escaped scrutiny. Good Good should explain why nobody within its operation objected before viewers were forced to do it for them. The PGA Tour should decide whether a generic statement is sufficient when a title sponsor has just demonstrated such appalling judgment.

Women should not have to keep explaining why simulated violence against them is not funny. They should not have to absorb another reminder that even organizations preaching inclusion can still treat their humiliation as marketable content.

Callaway exposed how quickly its supposed commitment to women disappears when there is a driver to sell — and how readily its own people will blame women for noticing. Until that changes, every promise about inclusion is just another hollow marketing campaign.

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