ASA Adjudication on Junkies Ltd

Ad

A leaflet, for a club night, was headlined “R U DSYLEXIC!” with the letter L facing the wrong way. Text below stated “dyslexic cook No1: Can you smell gas? dyslexic cook No2: I cant [sic] even smell my own name! THE NEW BRAND STUDENT NIGHT LAUNCHING THURSDAY FBEUARY th11”. A cartoon of Albert Einstein included a speech bubble, which stated “e=mc cubed”.

Issue

The complainant challenged whether the ad was likely to cause serious offence to people with dyslexia.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

Junkies said the name of the club night, which was aimed at young creative people and their peer groups within education, many of whom had dyslexia, was not intended to cause offence. They said several people involved with the night were dyslexic. They had considered public sensitivities from their own viewpoint and did not believe the ad was offensive, indeed it was intended as a celebration of dyslexia because they felt it should not be a barrier to success. Junkies said their promotional literature featured famous people who had achieved remarkable things and were dyslexic. The ad was one of a series that each featured a different famous person with dyslexia and their promotional literature was not damning of the condition but included text such as "Dyslexics Do It Better".

They said they had received hundreds of positive comments in support of their efforts, however, they acknowledged that the joke included in the ad might be interpreted as being a stereotype and in bad taste. Junkies said the ad was the only one in the series to incorporate such a joke and they would revise it. They said they had consulted a national dyslexia group, who were happy that the changes they proposed to make were in line with their practices.

Tokyo Industries said they initially expressed concern about the name of the night however the concept was explained to them and when they saw the promotional material they realised it featured some of historys most intelligent people. They reiterated the comments made by Junkies and also said the ad was not intended to cause offence.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted the advertisers comments and acknowledged Junkies willingness to amend the ad. We considered however the ad, in particular the deliberate errors in spelling and grammar, the letter L facing the wrong way, the dyslexic cooks joke and the Einstein cartoon, was likely to be interpreted as mocking people with dyslexia and suggesting they were stupid. We concluded that the ad was likely to cause serious offence.

The ad breached CAP Code clause 5.1 (Decency).

Action

The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Junkies to take care to ensure future marketing material was not likely to cause serious or widespread offence.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)