Reflecting public expectations, avoiding censorship

What makes an advertisement unacceptable? We apply the industry’s own rule – that ads should not cause ‘serious or widespread offence’.

Deciding whether or not to uphold complaints is not a question of censorship or social engineering. Rather, we aim to reflect public expectations, taking into account both medium and context.

Over time, the boundaries of offensiveness change. The challenge is to patrol the boundaries of expectation, not to try to enforce absolute standards of taste.

The 1994 Wonderbra campaign broke new ground with its sheer 'in your face' impact.

Right from its inception, the ASA was tasked with keeping ads ‘clean’. Four decades ago, before the development of effective sanctions, the ASA turned to the British Federation of Master Printers for help in discouraging advertisements that might be an affront to public decency. Today, the current self-regulatory system means that advertisers who persist in using shock tactics to grab attention, or use sensational or gratuitous images in the hope of getting media coverage, run the risk of becoming subject to poster pre-vetting. This means all their posters must be pre-approved by the Committee of Advertising Practice.

Lee Jeans (1997): Amusing or offensive?  Complaints about this ad were not upheld.

Less than a quarter of the complaints the ASA receives are about offensive ads, but our adjudications on those complaints attract the most attention and stimulate the most debate. Despite the headlines, research consistently shows that consumers enjoy advertising. Effective campaigns engage us, through information about new products, or through creativity and wit - and it is this engagement that is the aim of all advertisers. But how effective advertisements are in their attempts to inform or entertain is not the concern of the ASA. Instead, we act when the information appears to be dishonest or misleading, or when the attempt at entertainment has gone too far and become offensive.

Irn Bru (1998): Nearly 600 people objected that this advertisement was offensive and challenged the implication that the cow would enjoy becoming a burger.  The ASA decided the ad was unlikely to cause widespread or serious offence and that an investigation under the Codes was not justified.

Judging offence

Today, widespread access to the Internet means that consumers can have access to any material they like - acceptable or otherwise. Photographs of semi-naked women appear each day in national papers. The most popular TV programmes tackle controversial subjects before the 9.00pm watershed. Within this context, the ASA has to make judgements about what is offensive, or unacceptable, in today’s non-broadcast advertising. The self-regulatory system has had to prove its flexibility by adapting to changes in the wider environment in which advertising works.

1997: French Connection's use of its FCUK trademark challenged the public - and the ASA.

What hasn’t changed in forty years is the level of debate about what is acceptable and what isn’t. The wider public debates are reflected within our Council, a group of men and women who come from all walks of life, and have a variety of approaches. Discussion is intelligent and lively. Each ad is judged on its merit and in context. Decisions are taken by majority vote, but all Council members judge the ads against the criteria laid down in the Code: “Advertisements should contain nothing that is likely to cause serious or widespread offence. Particular care should be taken to avoid causing offence on the grounds of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or disability.”

The application of the Code changes with time, according to the context: be it world events, changing public attitudes, the medium or the audience. Some people may find some products offensive – but that is not grounds for objecting to advertisements for them.

Club 18-30 (1995): Complaints that this new campaign was offensive and socially irresponsible were upheld by the ASA.

When responding to complaints, the self-regulatory process means that the ASA investigates complaints about advertisements already in the public arena. We were not established to be a censor. The non-broadcast system contrasts with the  system of regulation for TV and radio commercials, where advertisements have to be pre-cleared. This would be an impossible task in non-broadcast advertising, where millions more ads are involved. Self-regulation means the responsibility rests with the advertiser, to ensure their ads comply with the Code. But sometimes, advertisers go too far.

Yves Saint Laurent Beaute Ltd (2000): This poster attracted the second biggest complaints tally ever.

Shock tactics

The ‘Beaver Espana’ poster campaign by Club 18 – 30 in 1995 was a marked change from earlier advertising by this brand, which had promised merely ‘Whispered good-nights’ and ‘Golden memories’. Suddenly, ‘Sex, sex, sex’ was available for viewing on the high street. We upheld complaints that some of the ads were offensive, while others were unacceptable and irresponsible in advocating alcoholic excess. Following this campaign and criticism of the poster industry a poster pre-vetting regime was introduced to stop persistent offenders from trying to shock deliberately. Poster advertisers who have had complaints upheld against them by the ASA are no longer able to undertake new campaigns with impunity.

'Scared? You should be.  He's a dentist': Complaints about this 1998 ad by the Commission for Racial Equality were not investigated.

Charities often use shocking or hard-hitting imagery to get their message across, but such approaches aren’t immune from complaints from members of the public. Charities often tell us, in their defence, that the circumstances their advertising portrays are realistic, and that they are portraying the type of situations they are working to prevent. Whilst research shows that charities are often shown greater tolerance by the public, who understand that they may need to shock to drive the message home, even charities can sometimes go too far. The prevailing rules of “serious or widespread offence” still apply.

British Safety Council (1995): This leaflet received 1,187 complaints - the most ever received about a single ad.

Hard-hitting

When the NSPCC came to CAP for Copy Advice with the ads for their ‘Full Stop’ campaign, the proposed strap line was: “I wish you’d died in my womb’. Advice from the Copy Advice team changed this to the ad below. Still hard-hitting, the ad retained its impact – and the campaign still won awards - but, in the view of CAP’s Copy Advice team, the changed ads were less likely to cause serious or widespread offence.

NSPCC (1999): Copy Advice was sought before the launch of this campaign.

For the most part, advertising changes without the influence of the ASA. If the ASA Council needs to reflect the nation’s changing expectations when judging what is likely to offend, so too do the advertisers themselves, as they try to engage the consumer. In 1982, the ASA conducted a study of women’s views of advertising. Three quarters of the women who took part in the research did not agree that ads had the capacity to degrade women. When the ASA repeated the research eight years later, three quarters of women said that advertising could help to establish unrealistic views of the way women should look and behave. Four years later still, in 1994, the Wonderbra campaign broke new ground with its sheer ‘in your face’ impact. Despite complaints that this advertisement was offensive to women, the ASA considered the humorous approach was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence.

In a similar vein, the 1997 Lee Jeans 'stietto heel' ad was also deemed to be humorous, although complaints by men about advertising belittling men have risen in recent years.

Balancing the right of advertisers to advertise with the rights of people not to be offended is not always easy.  The ASA Council makes its decisions about taste and decency issues using all the evidence available - while using common sense and making judgements that it believes are in tune with the public's expectations.  That means applying standards of acceptibility that are themselves in constant flux.