Ludwig,
I just did a quick scan of the ASB website and it appears that they have changed it, and now it is not so easy to find the list of companies that people have complained about.

In the past, reading through the complaints from the public, and then reading the responses of the ASB was often a chuckle, as the ASB would basically approve anything, no matter how bad the advertising.

What is interesting is the board of the ASB.

It says

“People sought for appointment to the Board ideally have an interest in, and views on, advertising and community standards.”

The board currently includes people such as TANVEER AHMED, THE HON JOHN BROWN, THOMAS KENEALLY, JOHN LEE, GARY RICE, NATASHA STOTT DESPOJA

Now this is a rather auspicious list, but unfortunately it has not improved the standards or honesty of most advertising.

Sell the sizzle but not the steak seems to be the ongoing motto of most advertising, and excessive advertising signs spread all over the place would now be the number one culprit for visual pollution of our towns and cities.

If this thread achieves anything at all it should be the recognition of the simple fact that sometimes those who claim to represent women might have another irons in the fire. That is why the sexual revolution was necessary in the first place. Freedom has to be fought for every single day and it is a hell of a lot easier for the dark side to triumph where a wedge can be forced between the sexes.

Women's sexuality was always the main fighting ground and it will continue to be into the future. No girl should grow up under the cloud that hung over female sexuality in the Fifties. It is an absolute disgrace that women's sexuality as faithfully represented in the Calvin Klein billboard - which most young women would recognise and respond to and it IS art not pornography - has again been labelled as dirty, dangerous and serving men not women. What a crock! That advertisement is so feminine and full of artistic creativity and merit. It is all in the mind.

While sexual honesty might trouble some of the older generation, especially those educated as Roman Catholics, that is no reason to strip young women of their birth rights.

Men can help by not getting sucked into gender wars through the inevitable (and very effective) baiting. That means attacking the issue and letting the odd few enticing wides to go through to the keeper.

Cornflower,

Brilliant posting on here. I agree with what you say wholeheartedly.

Yabby,

'Of course it is about what is in your mind. It is how the mind
works by association, which advertisers take advantage of.

Cornflower put the case very well, but in this case we have a few
odd women who are making wrong associations, which tells us something
about their minds.'

I second that. It tells us a lot about your mind pelican.

Though I wouldn't say 'wrong associations', I'd say 'odd'.

In the end I think it's troublesome that a minority's wild imagination can have such an effect as to have the advert removed. There should be a more objective test about a reasonable interpretation. In any work of art you can read into it all sorts of things. I'd bet if one read pack rape into an advert featuring a man at the 'mercy' of 3 women it would just bring howls of laughter.

I think it's interesting that if you reverse the genders, that kind of scene would be described by the same people as objectifying women.

So, depiction of 3 women lusting after a male (Ala lynx type advert maybe); Objectifying women.
3 men lusting after a female; Pack Rape of a woman.

The corollary of cornflowers great discussion here about the censoring of women's sexual fantasy is the damning and demonizing of men's sexual desire as necessarily predatory. In both scenarios above we're encouraged by some to read man as predator, woman as victim. It's high time this is rejected.

'has again been labelled as dirty, dangerous and serving men not women. What a crock! That advertisement is so feminine and full of artistic creativity and merit.'

Yes, doubly so as the men in it are even feminine. Just imagine, if the men were more masculine, or perhaps older than the woman. The rape cries would be stronger I believe. Or even if they dressed as bogans or blue collar workers. The lower class male or the more hairy male is even more fearsome and predatory and 'corrupt' than the smooth-chested metrosexual.

Vanna

<< “People sought for appointment to the Board ideally have an interest in, and views on, advertising and community standards.” >>

Hihihihehe. That’s funny!

Ideally?? So what they are really saying is that people appointed to this board don’t necessarily have to have any interest in, or views on, advertising or community standards!

Crikey! I would have expected that only experts in the field would have been eligible to sit on the Advertising Standards Board!

<< Now this is a rather auspicious list … >>

Ooow, I don’t think so. It’s a rather SUSpicious list if you ask me!

No wonder << it has not improved the standards or honesty of most advertising. >>

In the interests of public confidence, they really do need to have experts in the field on the panel, and not a set of odd-bods, who may or may not have any expertise or even any particular interest in the subject!