ASA Assesses Racist Advertising
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has received a flood of complaints against the Commission For Racial Equality’s (CRE) latest advertising campaign.
The three ads went up on poster sites around Britain last week. Each was deliberately racist and claimed to be for a non-existent company. One of the adverts can seen opposite; another shows a white business man standing on the hand of a black businessman as he climbs a ladder with the text “Dominate The Race”; the third shows a woman sitting on a bus eyeing a black man in front of her suspiciously – the ad is for a rape alarm and carries the line: “Because it’s a jungle out there.”
The ASA received 30 complaints within 2 days about the ads, and asked that they be pulled on Friday of last week, but it was on Monday that the CRE, as planned, replaced the posters with others asking: “Which was worse? This advert or your failure to complain?” and “Racism: condemn it or condone it. There’s no in-between.”
According to the CRE, the purpose of the ads was to prompt awareness and provoke a response, which it has succeeded in doing. A spokesperson for the ASA stated that there is a chance that the campaign violates the public order act. The Authority has a duty to ensure that all adverts are ‘legal, decent, honest and true’, and suspects the fulfillment of the first two criteria is lacking. The ASA spokesperson said: “The whole thing has backfired for the CRE.”
As a result of the complaints, the CRE could be the first British organisation to have all its advertising pre-vetted by the ASA, in line with new sanctions set up earlier in the year (see Newsline). If a complaint is upheld by the ASA, a poster alert will be sent out to the poster industry, and the product or service in question will then be subject to compulsory pre-checking procedures over a two-year period.
Matti Alderson, director general at ASA commented: “The industry’s threat of mandatory pre-vetting will further strengthen the self-regulatory system. The very small number of advertisers who produce posters that ignore public sensitivities cannot act with impunity. They will be forced to think again before creating a one-shock wonder.”
The irony of the situation is firstly that the CRE have been pulled up on issues of racism themselves, something which they aim to fight against, and secondly that the campaign was commissioned with the intent of provoking a reaction. The ASA pointed out that people were offended by the use of such imagery, regardless of its intention or intent to shock.
A spokesperson for the Commission for Racial Equality today told Newsline that the group is pleased to have provoked reaction, but will not be issuing an official statement until the ASA comes to a decision about the campaign.
Advertising Standards Authority: 0171 580 5555 Commission For Racial Equality: 0171 828 7022