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The Forum > Article Comments > Advertising blue > Comments

Advertising blue : Comments

By Michael Cook, published 2/1/2008

Surely it is not being prudish to expect neighbourhoods, where children and families congregate, remain free of sexually explicit advertising.

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The most that you can probably say about advertisements for condoms is that it may be in bad taste as some people are offended by sex being advertised in public places. However, to play the "children card" yet again makes me wonder what parents are trying to protect their children against. I am now well into my seventies, yet even in the days when I was growing up when religious dogma and the bible taught that anything sexual was sinful, I knew all about that stuff before I was 8 years old. It always seems to me to be a paradox that aborigines can dance topless outside the Houses of Parliament or at the Olympic games,or coloured people be portrayed naked in National Geographic, and it is accepted without comment, as it should be. Why should things as natural as eating or drinking be portrayed as corrupting children's minds. Perhaps I was lucky in growing up with animals that copulated freely, so there was never any question in my mind how we all originated.
The word pornography is used so freely now to describe anything slightly controversial. It should be used more consistently over the growth of violence depicted in videos and computer games. Education and sex should be an important part of any curriculum, and not be regarded in terms of nudge-nudge-wink-wink and something that was somehow smutty.
Posted by snake, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 11:02:49 AM
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When I read this article I assumed that the offending advert must have been something truly shocking to have elicited this outpouring of rage.

Then I followed the links and found the most innocuous of photos. How can this tame image cause such outrage? I expected to see flailing legs and protruding nipples. Instead we have a couple in a loving embrace with nary a naught bit to be spied.

Any child who works out what this photo is about has long since been sexualised. Why is it that those who have a censorial bent always claim to be protecting the kids? Why not just come out and say that the photo offends you and you'll say whatever needs to be said to remove the offending image?

Then the author tells us that the advert is a "grotesquely offensive slur on women". How? Beats me. But it doesn't hurt to get the radical feminists on side when pounding the censorship drum. Is every commercial image of an attractive young women a slur on all women? Perhaps I ought to be offended that the chap has looks, vigor and biceps that I can no longer aspire to.

"Surely it is not being prudish to expect that busy inner-city neighbourhoods...should remain free of sexually explicit advertising."
Yep. Prudish is exactly the right term.

First they came for the condom advertisers and I did not speak out.....
Posted by mhaze, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 1:11:01 PM
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Perhaps we should all wear hair shirts and whip ourselves during our daily "prayer" sessions, as do "faithful" members of Opus Dei, to overcome our carnal desires.
And put lace coverings on the legs of tables too, while we are at it.
Posted by Ho Hum, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 2:36:32 PM
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The advert reminds me of a poster I once saw many years ago, advertising the film Samson and Delilah, only this time someone stuck a condom advert on it!

A comment from the Aids council of Australia would be useful, detailing the figures on STD transmission, as there has been very minimal public advertising on this issue since the Grim Reaper, twenty one years ago.

Samson lost his hair, sounds as though Michael Cook has also!
Posted by Kipp, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 2:49:15 PM
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I agree with snake and mhaze. Having had a squizz at a photo of the offending billboard, I can see nothing there that I'd be worried about my kids or grandkids seeing. The picture is quite tasteful, there are no genitalia showing, and it is appropriate to the product being advertised.

As mhaze suggests, if kids can work out what's going on in the ad, surely they are sexually aware enough to be exposed to it. Besides which, promoting condom use has to be good in terms of preventing sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies in young people.

Michael Cook's objections are indeed "prudish".
Posted by CJ Morgan, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 2:59:47 PM
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The sex paranoid puritans at Opus Dei were essentially behind the production and promotion of one of the most vile pieces of sado-masochistic pornography ever produced---it was really a SNUFF film in disguise.
It was promoted by most "right"-thinking (heart dead) christians, including the then pope,as being the perfect missionary tool for bringing "christ" to a world mired in secularism and the evils of cultural "relativism".

I am of course referring to the movie The "Passion" of Christ by Mel Gibson.

To my mind this reference sums up the cultural implications of that vile work of "art".

1. http://www.logosjournal.com/isuue_3.2/hammer_kellner.htm
Posted by Ho Hum, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 3:19:42 PM
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For once I am in general agreement with all the posts on this thread. I also followed the links to this poster..and went on searching for a while before I realised that the one I was looking at was, indeed,the one other people's children should not be seeing.

For my part I would sooner my kids look at a poster like that than one advertising Maccas! As a bonus - if kids are really looking at this poster and thinking "oh look, there's a mummy and daddy doing IT" - then the concept of condoms becomes synonymous with the act of sex: and that's a message all our young should be getting.

I was also blown away by the author doing the exploitation of women number on this ad. Draping a scantily clad female over a tractor bonnet, or a computer console, is exploitation. But if an image of a woman who looks pretty content with her lot snogging with a true hunk of a guy is considered "exploitation" then we need an update of the definition of the word. I bet there are a million women looking at that ad thinking "I should be so lucky"!

This is not to say I am indifferent to the issues of womens' exploitation. I fight strongly against it in all areas of both my public and private life. But for the gods' sakes, let's get some perspective. Taking the bandwagon out for an airing on something like this completely negates the effect of riding it when necessary to argue against the very real ills of the world.
Posted by Romany, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 5:09:16 PM
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It really is stretching credibility to refer to an image of an upright couple, from the elbows up, with their arms around each other as 'doing it'. Far more likely that the ad is suggesting that this might be the time to be thinking about safe sex. Given Mr Cook's December article denouncing the proposal that a carbon tax be levied on babies, I think his real objection is to condoms, planned pregnancy and safe sex, rather than the innocuous billboard.
Posted by Candide, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 5:36:53 PM
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Michael Cook uses the emotional angle, Families and children. Indicating a religous fundamentalist thinking.

We where all children, we where all part of a family. Some of us had the luck to have parents who informed us,so when puberty set in, we knew what it was all about. We had the comfort of sharing our feelings and emotions with our parents.

As by the authors piece, if he has children, they will enter the real world ( if he will allow them), ignorant of their being and feelings.

Me thinks the author needs to get rid of his sexual hangup and childhood baggage!
Posted by Kipp, Wednesday, 2 January 2008 5:57:32 PM
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If Michael Cook believes that the billboard is Porn then I think we should doubt his mental functioning.
Posted by Kenny, Thursday, 3 January 2008 8:19:42 AM
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I’m with Michael ... almost.

Sure ... this particular billboard ad is pretty innocuous - no worse than an average bodice-ripper cover. What I disagree with is the pervasiveness of this kind of thing in the public domain - in advertising, on television, in film and anywhere else you find public space. At least you can choose to pick up a bodice ripper and look at the cover - not so with a 30-metre high billboard that you have to pass every day.

I’ve had enough of all this misguided inverted prudery – the kind that says the more sexuality and nudity we are obliged to look at or toilet obsessions we are forced to endure in the public domain – the more liberated and progressive we are as a society. Rubbish!

Today's Western society and the former society that banned innocuous books like Lady Chatterley’s Lover and introduced the Hollywood Code are just two sides of the same coin. They are both societies that are trying to exercise far too much control over the private domain.
Posted by SJF, Thursday, 3 January 2008 11:22:40 AM
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Unfortunately my post yesterday had a typo error. It should have been.

1. http://www.logosjournal.com/issue_3.2/hammer_kellner.htm

And who said Marxists cant provide us with some necessary insights into our culture?

Plus this reference also gives a unique understanding of the Passion movie and the deep underlying psycho-patholgy of the Opus Dei organisation.

2. http://www.matthewfox.org/sys-tmpl/htmlpage7

It is interesting that the author of this article was excommunicated by the "church" for his "heretical" views.
What are his views and what does he promote? The necessary values and attitude of universal tolerance and understanding, plus a genuine Ecumenism that seeks to bridge and dissolve cultural and religious differences.

By contrast the official "church" obnoxiously asserts that it is the only source of "truth" in the world, and that all other traditions are false and hence full of "relativistic" errors---and that, as such, the impulse to Ecumenical understanding is misguided.

Meanwhile the founder of Opus Dei was made a "saint" by the previous pope.
This sex paranoid puritan was an open aplogist and sympathizer with clerical fascism. In short he was a psycho-path. The cultural and political ramifications of his toxic ideology are described in the above two essays.
My advice would be to run as fast as you can away from an organisation that makes a "saint" out of a psycho-path and promotes a sado-masochistic SNUFF film as a "missionary" tool.
Posted by Ho Hum, Thursday, 3 January 2008 3:18:37 PM
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Anything that divides people, is wrong.
Posted by Kipp, Thursday, 3 January 2008 5:51:06 PM
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I'm not sure how you can say that Kipp.

Unfortunately, people are divided on pretty much everything.

As for this article, and this billboard... I really can't see the huge fuss. Then again, I've always through people concerned with things like this should be more focused on violence rather than sex, and there's plenty of more worthwhile things that Mr Cook could be protesting.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Friday, 4 January 2008 12:14:34 PM
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According to the Herald Sun link:
"The ASB will be forced to raise its standards after its own research found its board's attitude towards sex, sexuality and nudity in advertising was too soft.
"Findings released yesterday showed that board decisions needed to "more accurately reflect community standards on advertisements that portray sex, sexuality or nudity and discrimination or vilification".

So it seems the advertising board is out of touch after all? I think the board is out of touch, and I would be very interested to know more about this research on community standards. The ABS really seems in the pockets of advertisers in so many ways (except if you advertise children's party food, that is). Personally, I experienced this particular Durex ad as less offensive than the headache inducing neon yellow 'Want longer lasting sex?' billboards by the so-called Advanced Medical Institute. The bureau, in hearing complaints against the AMI billboard, found that because there was no picture, this ad's text was not directly discussing (advertising) penetrative sex! That ad, as a billboard, really did concern me regarding the effects on young children. And on my psyche as well, as a community notice it seemed so...brutal! Unlike the funny tv ads the company also ran at the time.
Posted by floatinglili, Saturday, 5 January 2008 1:06:51 PM
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Whilst I am not offended by the advert photo, the context of the advert is not something I want spalshed around the public areas of my suburb either.

I heard a radio version for a similar product which was played on the Pop FM channel my numerous children were 'forcing' me to endure in the car on the way back from Church.

In essence the dialogue went:

Male voice "What's a Quickie" condom?"

Female voice "it's the thinnest condom ever made...so the quicker you get it on, the quicker we can get it on!"

What is the message behind all these ads? Have a root and as long as we all use condoms everything is fine.

Not particularly edifying Sunday morning radio content. Needless to say, my children would not be here if that was my wife and I's attitude to sexuality and relationships!

The photo would be positive if it had a better catch phrase like - "If you can read this, thank goodness enough committed heterosexual monogamus couples exist in your community to ensure Western civilisation doesn't totally breakdown."

The author's general concern about the message is valid. Our local girls only highschool had a similarly ill-conceived and ill-placed clothing advert which was quickly removed.
Posted by Reality Check, Monday, 7 January 2008 1:24:36 PM
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Michael Cook wrote:
"The mask-like face of the woman is frozen and glassy-eyed. Is she being raped? Is she servicing a client?

Whatever is going on, it is raw sex, not romance, not love."

Like everyone else, I wondered if I was looking at the right photo. Raped? Servicing a client? Sorry, but she looks like she's about to get it on with someone she's totally into. Lucky her.

I think this ad is quite romantic and have no problem with sexy ads for condom. Having said that, I think the pervasiveness of sexual imagery is problematic and I dislike having to see women with their gear off everywhere I go. The late-night TV sleaze-a-thon of ads for sex lines and internet dating drives me (and my husband - because it's slightly uncomfortable to watch this stuff with your wife) batty. It's just too full-on for me. And for some of the men I know too - a friend once said to me, "I actually don't want to be turned on when I'm getting my lunch at work. I want some choice over my timing for that stuff, you know?"

Unfortunately, this article is so prudish and intellectually spurious that it's failing to make the valid points it should make.
Posted by botheration, Monday, 7 January 2008 1:56:02 PM
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