It looks like Dreamscape Networks have gone for notoriety to up their profile and drum up more business.
They have created a saucy advert featuring the pneumatic ex-Baywatch babe, Pamela Anderson, to drum up sales for their web domain business, which promptly got slapped down by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) who upheld complaints from just four prudish viewers, claiming that the ad "was likely to cause serious offence to some viewers on the basis that it was sexist and degrading to women". Seriously, they really said that.
They didn't buy Dreamscape's justification for the ad, which claimed that the ad was a comic parody, contained humorous content and certainly wasn't degrading or offensive to women, showing the two ladies as strong confident types with the fantasy being limited to Adam's fertile imagination. Despite this, the ASA ruled that it mustn't be shown again in its current form.
It looks like the spirit of the 20th century's ultimate prude, the campaigning fanatical Christian moral crusader that was Mary Whitehouse, lives on still fulfilling the role of killjoy for millions of viewers by forcing her religious views down their throats.
So, what's so contentious about this ad? It centers around a nerdy male character "Adam", stuck in a boring board meeting, which happens to be hosted by the lovely Pamela and her equally attractive assistant. Both ladies are dressed in smart business outfits, but do manage to show some cleavage. Our Adam then unsurprisingly starts having nerdy fantasies about the ladies: they're dressed in bikinis suggestively getting splashed with cream and cavorting around with each other, all in slow motion to suggestive music. You get the picture.
To me it's saucy, but not offensive by today's liberal standards and hardly likely to cause "harm and offense" as the ASA so prudishly put it. What makes their opinion more "correct" than yours or mine? It just boils down to more censorship with little justification.
The full ASA ruling can be seen here and the ad is currently still available and intact on YouTube below, so you can judge for yourself. But don't worry if it gets pulled by the time you see this story: we have a copy of it...
They have created a saucy advert featuring the pneumatic ex-Baywatch babe, Pamela Anderson, to drum up sales for their web domain business, which promptly got slapped down by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) who upheld complaints from just four prudish viewers, claiming that the ad "was likely to cause serious offence to some viewers on the basis that it was sexist and degrading to women". Seriously, they really said that.
They didn't buy Dreamscape's justification for the ad, which claimed that the ad was a comic parody, contained humorous content and certainly wasn't degrading or offensive to women, showing the two ladies as strong confident types with the fantasy being limited to Adam's fertile imagination. Despite this, the ASA ruled that it mustn't be shown again in its current form.
It looks like the spirit of the 20th century's ultimate prude, the campaigning fanatical Christian moral crusader that was Mary Whitehouse, lives on still fulfilling the role of killjoy for millions of viewers by forcing her religious views down their throats.
So, what's so contentious about this ad? It centers around a nerdy male character "Adam", stuck in a boring board meeting, which happens to be hosted by the lovely Pamela and her equally attractive assistant. Both ladies are dressed in smart business outfits, but do manage to show some cleavage. Our Adam then unsurprisingly starts having nerdy fantasies about the ladies: they're dressed in bikinis suggestively getting splashed with cream and cavorting around with each other, all in slow motion to suggestive music. You get the picture.
To me it's saucy, but not offensive by today's liberal standards and hardly likely to cause "harm and offense" as the ASA so prudishly put it. What makes their opinion more "correct" than yours or mine? It just boils down to more censorship with little justification.
The full ASA ruling can be seen here and the ad is currently still available and intact on YouTube below, so you can judge for yourself. But don't worry if it gets pulled by the time you see this story: we have a copy of it...