#canneslions bronze winner for Bayer makes fun of consent

I first saw this ad on Twitter, shared by marketer Cindy Gallop, with the comment "Don't use this to sell aspirin, male-dominated ad industry, & don't award it, male-dominated juries. #canneslions"

Seriously. I'm a male Creative Director in this industry, and I think it's awful.

The ad is part of a series by AlmapBBDO of Brazil for Bayer. It won a Bronze Lion at Cannes 2016 in the Outdoor category.

The other two in the winning entry were a little less explicit:

These are part of a over-arching campaign that describes situations that might give the listener/victim a headache. They play all kinds of stereotypes about ex-wives and protective fathers, and are mostly harmless.

But not "'Don't worry, babe, I'm not filming this'.mov"

I see a lot of regressive ads coming out of Brazil, and I'm used to a certain kind of humour in them. But this one, translated into English for an international awards show, is really bad timing for a joke about non-consensual filming of sex.

Yeah, yeah. Call me an "SJW" if you want. But I'm trying to raise a son into a man who doesn't exploit and abuse women. The idea of filming and possibly sharing an intimate sex tape of a woman without her consent is just not funny anymore. It's the kind of bro-attitude that we should be denormalizing, rather than normalizing, along with jokes about other kinds of sexual violation.

Bayer, BBDO, and Cannes should do better than this. It's 20-effing-16.

UPDATE: Cindy Gallop added, via Facebook, some further context as to why this ad's timing is so bad.

UPDATE 2: Adweek reports that BBDO global creative chief David Lubars, who stated: "I learned last night that one of our very own agencies had a pretty scammy ad in the festival, and it won a Lion, I told them to return it. Because I don't want that kind of Lion. BBDO doesn't want that kind of Lion."

It turned out that the sexism was one thing, but what the global ad giant couldn't stand was that AlmapBBDO had paid for their own media placement. Even though Bayer had signed off on the ad, the agency paying to make it official is against the rules.

Global advertisers just can't leave Christ The Redeemer alone

Via Adrants

Last week, it was Rai (Italy) and Sportsbet (Australia). Now it's Ladbrokes, a European online gambling site operating in UK, Ireland, Belgium and Spain.



According to Adrants' Steve Hall, The Archdiocese of Rio demanded the video be removed from YouTube and the advertiser complied. But by then, it had already been copied reposted by others.

The stunt is, of course, fake. But as I mentioned before, the Archdiocese owns the image rights to the statue, putting them in a position to sue advertisers who use it.

Christ The Redeemer in a soccer jersey provokes anger, possible lawsuits

Via abcnews.go.com

It's not the first (or the worst) example of Rio de Janeiro's monumental Christ The Redeemer statue being used in an ad campaign. But maybe the context of the World Cup has people particularly jumpy.

In one example, from Australia, involved a giant inflatable Jesus hovering over Melbourne, sporting a Team Australia soccer jersey with the logo of bookmaker Sportsbet and the hashtag #KEEPTHEFAITH.



While Australia is known for edgy advertising, this stunt upset Reverend Tim Costello, chair of the Australian Churches Gambling Taskforce. He told the press, "One of the great statues in Rio is Jesus, and Brazil is a Catholic nation that takes its faith seriously and its football fanatically."

Indeed, Brazil's church was deeply offended. But by another campaign that had Jesus join Team, Italia:

Via NY Daily News

NY Daily News reports that The Brazilian Catholic Church  threatened to sue Italian broadcaster Rai after it showed the statue in an Italian jersey in its promotional video for its coverage of the World Cup.



While this upset the The Archdiocese of Rio on religious grounds, the issue could actually be one of intellectual property. The Archdiocese has image rights over the statue. After they threatened to sue Rai for $5.4 million, the network pulled the ad.

My own sensitivities are not too bruised by poking fun at The Jesus, since he's so embedded in secular western culture. But the intellectual property argument for this particular representation could be a real headache for cheeky advertisers.

UPDATE: Ad Critic Joe La Pompe informs me that it is a well-worn old idea!

Paddy Power are being assholes for a cause now

C'mon England! #BrazilNuts pic.twitter.com/8O1Ayyd8TR
— Paddy Power (@paddypower) June 7, 2014

The Tweet above showed up on Saturday, and people went nuts on the online gambling brand.

Is the picture real? If it is then theyre disgusting “@paddypower: Get behind Roy's Boys! #BrazilNuts pic.twitter.com/2lKLxPt6hR” cc @PicPedant
— 4tis (@4tis) June 8, 2014

That could be the cure for cancer gone right there. Oh well, it is the world cup. "@paddypower: #BrazilNuts pic.twitter.com/vs3FeeeUj4"
— Ben Prater (@benpratershow) June 7, 2014

Hoped it wasn't real. Wow. Away to close my account. RT “@paddypower: Run, forest, run! #BrazilNuts pic.twitter.com/Yk0vn77BrU”
— Kenny Stewart (@Kenny__Stewart) June 7, 2014

But then yesterday, they revealed the whole thing as a "corporate social responsibility" campaign:

Wood you believe it? http://t.co/DxupnvU2Lf #SaveTheRainforest pic.twitter.com/UT3DA4igl4
— Paddy Power (@paddypower) June 8, 2014

Of course it was faked. How could anyone doubt that? But it's interesting to note that Paddy Power, who are not exactly know for social sensitivity in advertising, used predictable outrage as a way to get rainforest issues in front of soccer fans.

No, deforestation is not a laughing matter. But they played Twitter like a piano. And like it or hate it, that's one for the record books.

Heineken is pretty sure there are no female soccer fans (in Brazil)

Adfreak's Tim Nudd writes:

Evidently not worried about cries of sexism, Heineken has organized a giant shoe sale in Brazil this Saturday—so that women will flock to it and leave their boyfriends and husbands in peace to watch the Champions League final between Real Madrid and Atlético de Madrid.

Really? Really:



I guess Heineken and and their friends at Wieden+Kennedy São Paulo forgot that not only do women in Brazil like sports, but also that these types of campaigns tend to get international brands in trouble.

"Don't worry your pretty little head about this man stuff on the field.
Just grab me a Heinie and go shoe shopping."
(Photo via Mirror UK)

This bullshit is even sadder when you realize that women in Brazil were not allowed to play soccer, professionally, until 1979.

Aline Pellegrino was the captain of the Brazilian women's national team from 2005-2013, has been on three Olympic teams and played in the Women's World Cup twice. She told PRI, "All the girls of my generation played with young boys. I didn't see women playing on TV. There was nobody to look up to or be inspired by."

Ms. Pellegrino co-founded Guerreiras Project to "use futebol as a tool to promote gender justice and create possibilities for more equitable and sustainable ways of being."

That's right, Heineken. Soccer is actually a major feminist issue in Brazil. For years, women have been fighting to be taken seriously as athletes there. They are referred, jeeringly, to as "zapatón" [actually, "sapatão" - see comments] or big shoes. It's a homophobic slur against lesbians.

And Heineken just told them to go buy some shoes and leave soccer to the menfolk.

Domino's pizza targets bad home cooks with "food fails"

Ads Of The World

I doubt there's one popular internet photo meme that doesn't get turned into an ad campaign. In this case, it's "Food Fails" — pictures of really pathetic dishes shared on Tumblr, Instagram or elsewhere (Two of my favourites are Dimly Lit Meals for One, and the stomach-churning Cooking For Bae.)

Ads Of The World

This campaign by Artplan, Brazil, is sort-of funny. But personally, I find the execution lacks finesse. Why not just show the resulting dish, the Domino's logo, and a phone number to order?

Ads Of The World

That said, I can't help but point out that poor cooking skills are a major contributor to poor diet.  And the decades-long push for cheap, tasty and convenient fast food continues to erode these basic life skills.

Via Attic Paper

Via Country Chic Mom

Do we really need fast food brands telling us that we shouldn't bother making our own food?

What ISN'T wrong with this violence against women awareness campaign?

Via Ads of The World

This is a real shame, in every sense of the word. I quite liked last year's "You Are Not a Sketch" campaign for this client, Star Models of Brazil, by an agency called Revolution.

But this one? Not. At. All.

Via Ads of The World

Let's ignore the fact that it wasn't translated well into English. (Interestingly, the same campaign on Coloribus gives a different version: "It was the cleavage" and "It was the behaviour") I can't seem to find any Portuguese versions, which leads me to suspect that the agency, Revolution Brasil, created them specifically for international Web sharing.

But these are only shareworthy for how misguided they are. The assumption, that the woman in the middle of each ad is the type of person the viewer would assume was "asking for" sexual violence, and the two on the sides are not, is trying to push a point that no victim is to blame. But in doing so, it uncovers the agency team's prejudice against certain women and in doing so simply reinforces the idea that religious people, mothers, and soldiers are "better" than women who dress "slutty" or dare to have tattoos and pink hair. (WTF is that anyway? An indication that she's rebellious?)

This is not the way to address serious problems, which are commonly known in the present dialogue as "slut shaming" and "victim blaming".  You may be sick of those words, but they represent concepts that clearly are not getting through to everyone. Especially in the ad industry.

Two campaigns, same concept, same country, competing products

Ads of The World's Ivan Raszl pointed out that both of these ads were submitted to him on the same day:

Post by Ads of the World.

What is going on here? The first is by Artplan in Brasília, Brazil. The second is by Propeg, in Bahia, Brazil. They're both for armoured vehicles. Coincidence? It can happen to anyone. But is this too statistically unlikely to be innocent?

I would love to be a (portuguese-speaking) fly on the wall at either of those agencies today...

Brazil to Adidas: Stop sexualizing our culture

Screencap via Edmonton Journal

Who knew?

Adidas (AKA "All Day I Dream About Sex") was trying to cash in on Brazil's bethonged sex appeal as part of their 2014 World Cup sponsorship, when Brazil asked them to stop.

A statement from Brazil's tourism board stated, "Embratur strongly repudiates the sale of products that link Brazil's image to sexual appeal," claiming that the shirts promoted sex tourism — a challenge for any country hosting a premium international sporting event.

Via The Guardian

Brazil has its first female president, Dilma Rousseff, and The Guardian reports that she said her government is going to "crack down" on sex tourism — particularly the exploitation of children — during the World Cup this June.

Brazil's ministry of women's affairs also issued a statement, saying, "This is all the more shocking in a country that just elected a woman as its highest authority, which brought greater respect for women and zero tolerance for any form of violence against them."

Adidas has since agreed to discontinue the shirts.

Via cntraveler.com

Times sure do change.

Teen who posted "Blacks for Sale" ad is "not racist"

An ad posted on a popular Brazilian online marketplace, offering "Black for diverse uses" for 1 Real (41¢ USD), has been traced to an angry 15-year-old.

The ad suggested that the human beings for purchase could "serve as carpenters, masons, cooks, security guards, nightclub bouncers, janitors, garbage collectors or housekeepers."

According to NDTV, the ad, which was pulled from Mercado Livre after massive online protest, was tracked by police to a teen living in "a northern Rio slum."

Rio police said it had been posted by a 15-year-old who was frustrated because he felt he had been shut out of a computer course by a quota system set up to encourage black students.  

Local daily O Dia quoted Police Inspector Gilson Perdigao as saying the boy had been held for questioning for two hours but would not be charged as he had no previous history of racist aggression. 

The youth's mother, a 43-year-old teacher, told the paper: "He regrets what he did. My son is not racist and asks black people for forgiveness. 

"This was a thoughtless act because he failed the first phase of the exam," she added.

First of all: yes, you're racist. Second, what is a teacher doing living in a "slum"?

In Brazil, this is more than a case of insensitivity. It's criminal.

Veja (Portuguese, translated by Google) cites The National Ombudsman of Racial Equality,
Carlos Alberto Silva Júnior, who explains that Article 20 of Law No. 7.716/1989,  provides for imprisonment from two to five years and fines for people convicted of practicing, inducing or inciting discrimination or prejudice based on race, color, ethnicity, religion or national origin.

Apparently, those who share the offensive material in blogs or social networks with intent to denigrate or discriminate can answer the same crimes. (Yikes!)

NDTV adds that in 2012, Brazil enacted a law that reserves 50% of university placements to students from public schools, with priority given to black, mixed race and indigenous people.

This case is an important reminder of how racism often manifests itself as the anger and frustration of one socioeconomically disadvantaged population against another, who they believe are receiving unfair privilege.

"White" people are pink, and "Black" people are... green?

Cute little gum campaign, eh? Gum "made for kissing". Okay, maybe it's a little weird, but the idea is clear enough.

The ads are by Leo Burnett Tailor Made, Brazil. Now, Brazil also has a sizeable population of African decent. We wouldn't want to leave them out, would we?

"But"... I'm sure someone at the agency said, "if we have a black man kissing a pink bubble, then it looks like an interracial thing, and that might distract people from the simple campaign message."

"Does Topline make any brown flavours?" someone else might have replied, in a frantic search for a quick-fix that would keep the campaign on deadline.

Whatever the conversation, this is what they ended up with:

Well, okay then. I guess Captain Kirk isn't the only one into green women.

All images via Ads of The World.

Drunk and camwhoring "babies" used to sell infant monitors

Via Ads of The World

These are supposedly for Motorola, by Revolution, Brazil. I'm not even sure what to believe anymore, after all the ad spoof idiocy that's been going on lately.

If these are "real" (as in, approved by client for publication) they are a really bad idea for the brand. If not, they are still tacky and weird.

Via Ads of The World

The other two show a guy getting a huge chest tattoo and a shark diver.

Are Bob Marley and Barack Obama products of people overcoming racism?

Via Ads of The World

This Brazilian anti-discrimination campaign caught my eye, because Bob Marley has always come up when I argue with people about the social construction of "race". Bob's father, Norval Sinclair Marley, was ethnically English. His mother, Cedella Booker, was Afro-Caribbean. Bob grew up in his mother's culture, however, and was committed to the Afrocentric Rastafarian religion. As far as Bob Marley was concerned, he was "black". But he acknowledged his background this way:

I don't have prejudice against meself. My father was a white and my mother was black. Them call me half-caste or whatever. Me don't deh pon nobody's side. Me don't deh pon the black man's side nor the white man's side. Me deh pon God's side, the one who create me and cause me to come from black and white.

In this way, Bob Marley is a good physical symbol of overcoming prejudice. Especially since he had to deal with racism from both of his ancestral communities.

Via Ads of The World

US President Barack Obama's background is well-known. His father was Kenyan, and his mother Anglo-American. He was raised in his mother's culture, and actually faced the preposterous question of whether he was "black enough" to represent African Americans. At the same time, his presidency is viciously vilified by white American racists who can't stand the idea of a black president.

Using a "mixed marriage" as a symbol of overcoming hate is interesting, because the present debate over marriage equality for same-sex couples frequently draws comparisons with the days of anti-miscegenation laws.

Via Twitter

In my great-grandmother's day, even marriages between Catholics and Protestants were considered "mixed". That gives you some idea of how far we've come.

But where I wish we would go is to the post-racial world, where people are identified as humans belonging to diverse cultural groups, rather than being labelled based on the external (and genetically minuscule) climate adaptations that give us the racist categories of "black", "white", etc.

One love.

Berlusconi, Bush and Kim Jong-il compared to tenacious turds

The ads are for Bisalax, a laxative. The English translation of the copy says "Don't let it overstay".

These nifty ads are by Artplan in São Paulo, Brazil. North Korea begins bombing in five minutes...

Via Ads of The World

Clever ads proclaim, "Live theatre has always been 3-D"

How do you show the full dimensionality of live performance in a 2-D print ad? Brazilian agency Escala has come up with a pretty clever solution. Although I suppose you have to had experienced those headache-inducing blue and red glasses to really get it.

See the full agency credits at Ads of The World.

Coffee ad says it's "more black" than jazz performers

I noticed a colleague viewing this campaign on Ads of The World, and my first thought was "what gorgeous art direction!" Then I read the headline.

The wordplay on black things and "black" people is common in advertising. I even saw it used in a local campaign in Barbados, where Afro-Caribbean people are in the vast majority. Brazil is also a multicultural country, with many people of African origin. So I ask you, is my discomfort with this campaign simply a matter of white Canadian guilt?

For me, the ads are puzzling. It could be that there was something lost in translation. Are they saying that their coffee is "more black" than the jazz musicians they portray? Than the music they're playing? 

Blackness in coffee isn't just about not having cream or milk. It also refers to roast and brew strength. So their coffee is more intense?

I don't know. Some other cultures seem to be far more comfortable using a broad term for dark skin colour, culture and/or ancestral origin (whether code for "FUBU" or "other") as a throwaway ad gag. But for me it's bad enough labelling people, based on assumptions about "race," in casual conversation. I don't need brands reinforcing a bad habit.

Via Uproxx

Will we ever get over this shit?

Comedy Central Latin America: "BLEEP Canada"

Ads of the World just posted this bizarre video promoting Comedy Central's expansion into Latin America. Created by Wieden + Kennedy,  Brazil, it presents a self-deprecating nature documentary satire of what happens to Canadian hawks that migrate to South America:



As a Canadian, I am not in the least offended. But I laughed.

Advertising is not art, and this art is not advertising

Via Ads of The World

The concept for this Brazilian lingerie ad is simple enough: Even famously-topless mermaids can't resist a Nonsanta bra. But the execution? The illustration is dark, desperate and utterly unpersuasive.

I am always baffled when art directors take the first part of the titles too seriously. The "art" of advertising is about clear and memorable visual communication, not forcing the viewer to work to develop their own interpretation of its deeper meaning.

Art is a wonderful thing. Advertising is not. But it has an important job to do.

What examples of ads overshadowed by their art have you seen recently?

Are men's minds this dirty and corrupt?

Via Ads of The World

That appears to be the message of Giovanni+DraftFCB's ads for a men's bath sponge. The Hieronymus Bosch-like illustration by Estúdio Ícone is awesome. And it's true that sex is on most men's minds most of the time.

But to the point where their lust is constantly threatening marriage? I guess I have a better opinion than that of my fellow man.

Via Ads of The World

The one showing corruption is also troubling if you believe that "nice guys" exist. But hey— they're just ads, right?  Brazilian ads at that. I think my male ego can take a little gender-slander now and then.

Seems like an awful lot of work to sell a sponge, though.

2013 Pirelli calendar features clothed models, one of whom is pregnant

Well, that's a surprise.

The Pirelli calendar, a high-end promotional item since 1964, has also become known for its "arty" erotic nude photos of supermodels by a-list photographers. But as Buzzfeed's Amy Odell reports, 2013 photographer Steve McCurry elected not to photograph any of the models naked. The Associated Press adds that the calendar also includes non-models such as actress Sonia Braga and singer Marisa Monte, "chosen not only for their looks but also for their commitment to worthy causes".

Of course, the calendar still manages to eroticize some of its subjects, including then-pregnant Brazilian model Adriana Lima (above). However, it also features street scenes from the shoot location in Rio de Janiero.

Interesting development.