But where do lines of acceptability or offensiveness get drawn? Earlier this year the New Zealand Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) announced the most complained about ads ever.

Categories ranged from political advocacy to household products. And the most complained about spot belonged to Hell Pizza's "Lust condom" mailers. The brand's "Hell Crossed Buns" billboard came in third.

This is not surprising, given the brand is often in the headlines for its provocative campaigns. Controversy is clearly part of the marketing strategy.

Facebook said it has removed more than 5,000 ad-targeting categories to limit the ability of advertisers to exclude users based on ethnicity or religion.

Until now, when an advertiser created an ad for Facebook, a tab "to exclude persons who correspond more or less to the following criteria" allowed for the audience to be filtered based on terms such as "halal," "Islamic vocabulary" or "Shariah."

These terms have now been eliminated.

Advertisers will now have to go through a process of certification to educate them on the "difference between acceptable ad targeting and ad discrimination," Facebook wrote in a blog post on Tuesday.

Facebook France communications representative, Ben Puygrenier, says the religious aspect of the advertising targeting criteria was significant.

"Most targeting options allowed advertisers to identify and exclude ethnic and religious groups," he said.

"Hence, by blocking people interested in the Jewish feast of the Passover, an advertiser could prevent Jewish web surfers from seeing certain ads," he explained.

Facebook is popular among advertisers because it gives them access to an audience of 2.2 billion users and allows them to slice and dice that audience with precision, so they can reach the exact people they're looking for.

But offering such precise targeting to its advertising customers left Facebook exposed to various forms of manipulation, necessitating the current review of its policies and practices.

Source

• La Croix
• CNet
• Buzzfeed News
• Image: The Telegraph

The lawsuit was lodged last year by the Washington Archdiocese after the transit company rejected the Christmas advertisement (ad) the Archdiocese wanted to put on a bus.

The ad showed silhouetted images of the three wise men and a message to "find the perfect gift" in the Catholic church.

The WMATA said the ad violated the First Amendment and pointed to its policy and guidelines about issue-oriented ads, where political, religious and advocacy ads are all banned.

Guideline 12 specifically bars ads that "promote or oppose any religion, religious practice, or belief."

Challenging this perspective, the Archdiocese said guideline 12 violated the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

It asked that WMATA accept the ad and requested the court reject key portions of the company's ban on issue-oriented ads.

The judge's decision was in favour of the transport company: "WMATAs advertising space is a non-public forum," and therefore the First Amendment argument does not apply.

At the same time, the judge said so long as WMATA rejects ads from or against all religions (and groups espousing secularism), the company's decision is not a violation of the First Amendment.

The WMATA policies were implemented after an Islamophobic activist submitted an ad that showed an image of the prophet Muhammad.

Source

• WTOP
• DCIST
• 4Washington
• Image: CruxNow

Among them are representatives from medical colleges and organisations, universities, churches, the Heart Foundation and the Cancer Society.

The petitioners have identified four priority actions:

• Phase out alcohol advertising
• Phase out alcohol sponsorship
• Institute a minimum unit price for alcohol
• Increase the tax on alcohol

"This Call for Action has resulted from concern about the continuing damage alcohol misuse is causing too many New Zealanders" says Dr Geoff Robinson, medical spokesperson for Alcohol Action NZ, which has led the initiative.

"Current evidence supports the effectiveness of these four actions to reduce the levels of violence, abuse, illness and addiction that result from the way New Zealanders are drinking," says Professor Jennie Connor, another medical spokesperson of Alcohol Action NZ.

"The group estimates that close to 1000 deaths a year occur in New Zealand due to alcohol abuse and that a quarter of Kiwis over the age of 15 "have a sustained pattern of problematic drinking".

The Auckland City Council has recently proposed some law changes regarding the purchase and use of alcohol.

Peter Lyons writing in the New Zealand Herald describes the proposed changes as "a policy that fails to address the underlying issues around alcohol abuse."

"The proposed local alcohol policy for Auckland City involves a move back to setting closing times. Outer-city drinking establishments will close at 1am whereas inner-city establishments will all close at 3am."

"This will create an interesting meet-and-greet environment for door staff in inner-city bars around this time. Watches will need to be synchronised to prevent bitter disputes. It is a policy that could be described as back to the future."

"The real culprits in the damage caused by excessive alcohol consumption are the alcohol producers and distributors and the off-licence retail outlets."

"The pubs, nightclubs and other drinking establishments are the unwitting victims of very effective lobbying at the national level. This is now being played out in local government alcohol policies," said Lyons

Peter Lyons, an economics teacher at St Peter's College in Auckland

Source

• OneNews
• Scoop
• New Zealand Herald
• Image: healthlyfamiliesbc.ca

The advertisement for online electricity store Powershop shows the Chinese former dictator surrounded by Chinese people and soldiers posing with guns, and carries the slogan 'Same Power Different Attitude'.

Powershop is the same business that produced an advertisement depicting the Pope at the time, Pope Benedict XVI, officiating at a same sex wedding.

Auckland Transport communications manager Sharon Hunter said as a general rule they did not want to have adverts on shelters that were designed to "shock, offend or be controversial".

"Something which may be funny to one person can easily be offensive to another.

"On this occasion we believed Powershop's advertisement may potentially cause offence to Auckland's Chinese population".

A Blogger on the New Zealand Conservative Website remarks:

"Strange, how potentially offending the Chinese Government (I mean, come on, this is not poking fun at Chinese people - Chairman Mao represents the Chinese Government, not the people!) immediately creates a proactive reaction from the Council-owned company, while as an ad poking fun at the Pope Emeritis (supposedly marrying two men when the Catholic Church is totally against same-sex marriage) who represents almost as many Catholics as Chinese people (1.1 billion vs 1.2 billion) does not result in a ban on that other ad!"

Powershop chief executive Ari Sargent said he was not aware of any official complaints about the advertisement, which has appeared online and on billboards in Auckland and Wellington.

He said previous campaigns had been more likely to cause offence than the Chairman Mao advert. Powershop had received only one complaint through its call centre, and would be asking Auckland Transport to review the decision.

Source

• New Zealand Conservative
• New Zealand Herald

Massey University health psychology associate professor Antonia Lyons says checking Facebook was part of their everyday routine and it was used as a platform to organise social events, many of which revolved around drinking. It was also used to share alcohol-related updates and photos with friends.

Lyons said this information, combined with bar and alcohol brand pages, had normalised the culture of intoxication among young people.

These pages also had games and giveaways that appealed to children and teenagers, Lyons said. "What they're doing is grooming the next generation of drinkers."

Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: The Variant

The advert for Barber Brown's hair salon, which is based in Bristol but has a string of salons across the southwest of England, featured a photo of Jesus Christ bathed in light.

Text on the press advert stated: "He is coming ... Better get your hair done!"

Two people complained that the advert was offensive to Christians and that the ad 'implied that Jesus would judge people on their outward appearance' and was offensive as it 'depicted the Second Coming as humorous'.

A spokesman for the barber shop said that in the past flyers advertising the hairdressers had been handed to local churches and that most people were 'positive' about the press advert.

They said it was 'not their intention to cause offence' and that the advert was 'meant to be humorous and different rather than offensive'.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) today cleared the advert, stating is had not breached guidelines. Continue reading

The angelic beings are seen tumbling to Earth because they are attracted to a man wearing Axe deodorant.

"A viewer who complained to the ASA about the advert said the suggestion that angels — God's messengers — would literally fall for a man wearing this deodorant was incompatible with his belief as a Christian," reported the Times of South Africa daily newspaper.

"The advert for Axe deodorant depicts winged, attractive women crashing to earth in what appears to be an Italian town, and then being drawn towards and sniffing a young man who has used the deodorant. The text at the end of the ad reads: 'Even angels will fall,'" reported the Times.

"As such, the problem is not so much that angels are used in the commercial, but rather that the angels are seen to forfeit, or perhaps forego their heavenly status for mortal desires," ruled the ASA. "This is something that would likely offend Christians in the same manner as it offended the complainant."

Sources

• Times of South Africa
• Image: Beliefnet News