Controversial ad campaigns bring flood of complaints

By Karen Scherer

This is already proving to be a vintage year for controversial advertising.

The Advertising Standards Complaints Board normally gets about 10 complaints a week but less than eight weeks into the New Year, it has already received several months' worth.

The most controversial campaigns so far have been Toyota's "bugger" ad (and Mitsubishi's response) and the anti-Hero ad published by the New Zealand Herald.

Labour MP Lianne Dalziel has complained about Radio Pacific's new campaign, which includes yet another attempt to stir up debate on immigration issues, and the Warriors have also been accused of glorifying violence with their Mark Graham ads.

Several ads have been killed off before they've even appeared. An alternative Toyota ad, featuring a shotgun, was ditched by Saatchi & Saatchi's Wellington office in favour of the "bugger" campaign, while the Newspaper Publishers Association has advised its members not to use two Radio Pacific ads - one using the image of Jesus Christ, the other highlighting homosexuality.

Even the NPA's opinion has not been good enough for some newspapers. Another ad in the Radio Pacific series, concerning abortion, was rejected by the Dominion although it was run by the Herald..

The Pacific campaign has been put together by Auckland agency DDB. Group account director Philip O'Neil is not quibbling with the NPA over the Christ ad - the Crimes Act makes it illegal to publish blasphemous material - but admits he is concerned by what he sees as a double standard at work.

"What I would question - and I think what Radio Pacific would certainly question - is why there is a law which protects that particular group in society and not any other, like homosexuals for example?"

According to Herald editor Gavin Ellis, the paper felt obliged to run an anti-Hero ad because of the Advertising Standards Authority's code of ethics in relation to advocacy advertising. The code is intended to ensure the democratic right to freedom of speech, where there is no commercial gain involved.

O'Neil questions whether the advocacy guidelines are in fact relevant, as the ad called for donations and could, he believes, be seen as commercial advertising.

"In my view it was inherently anti-gay, and if you replaced the word gay with any racial minority you chose, you would have an unbelievably offensive piece of communication ... I also think it's slightly odd that you can run an ad that says 'bugger' seven times on a Sunday evening but I can't run an ad that raises a question over religion."

Toyota's marketing manager, Debbie Pattulo, says the company has so far received more than 200 phone calls over the "bugger" ad: "It's probably swinging the favourable way, but it's definitely a mix."

TVNZ has also been inundated with calls. "I think it's the most we've ever had for a single ad," says spokesman Liam Jeory. Interestingly, says Jeory, TVNZ has not received any calls about another ad that uses the word "bastard" - probably, he muses, because the other ad is not so successful.

In fact, it is not the first time the word "bugger" has been used in advertising in this country - it has previously appeared on radio as part of a road safety campaign. The resulting complaint was not upheld because of its context.

In Britain, the Advertising Standards Authority carries out regular surveys to gauge public opinion of advertising. Its most recent survey, published last July, showed increasing public concern over "bad" language. Even words such as "pillock", "git", "bloody" and "damn" were considered unacceptable by a large proportion of those surveyed, while deliberately misspelled alternatives (such as "peace off" and "bullsheet") were also given the thumbs-down.

The chairman of New Zealand's ASA (who also happens to be the head of the NPA), Phil O'Reilly, says the authority is happy to rely on the good sense of the complaints board, on which industry members are outnumbered by independent members.

"If anything, I think the board errs on the conservative side, and that's no bad thing, either," he says. "I'd rather advertising standards followed public opinion than led it."

The head of the Advertising Agencies Association, David Innes, agrees such conservatism is necessary to prevent regulation. However, he admits to being annoyed by what he describes as a "peculiar double standard" between real life and life as it is depicted in advertising.

The Toyota ad, he believes, is a sign of the times. "I guess it really reflects the fact that society has changed. Swearing is more common - particularly among women - than it ever used to be. I personally wouldn't have thought the use of the word 'bugger' was going to bring an end to civilisation as we know it."

Indeed. Try doing an Internet search for "bugger" and you will come up with thousands of Web sites, ranging from a company called Snugger Bugger International, to a site called simply "B is for Bugger". A quick scan of the sites shows few, if any, refer to the word's literal meaning.

The ASA's executive director, Glen Wiggs, notes the complaints board once dismissed a complaint over the use of the word "frigging", believing most people did not even know the word's true origins.

Wiggs also defends the advocacy guidelines under which the anti-Hero ad was published. Although such guidelines are necessary to ensure freedom of speech it is a different story, he believes, where commercial gain is involved.

"If it's advocacy, we do allow more leniency. If we didn't do that there would be no political advertising at all, because if you take apart any political advertisement, it's misleading."

O'Reilly agrees: Radio Pacific's ads do not fall into the same category as the anti-Hero ad, he says, because they're trying to sell a radio station.

"Even if the Christ ad hadn't been a breach of the law - and it's a pretty old and cobwebby sort of law - our advice to member newspapers still would have been that it would have been offensive to a wide range of people and therefore in breach of the ASA's code of ethics."

As for the Toyota and Mitsubishi ads, it does not mean that the floodgates have now been opened for advertisers to use swear words. "I would have thought they're pushing the bounds - it remains to be seen which way the ASCB will go on that."

Nevertheless, it is also worth keeping in mind, he says, that the largest number of complaints the board has ever received was over a radio ad for the Open Polytechnic. The ad suggested that if listeners didn't educate themselves, they could end up as paperweights - or even worse, line dancers. More than 500 angry line dancers protested. The complaint was not upheld.