Watchdog bites Mattesons saucy sausage ad The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has rather churlishly ruled that four innuendo-packed radio ads for Mattesons smoked sausages "could cause harm to children". The first ad - broadcast on Forth One, Clyde Radio and Real Radio - promisingly began with a male voice saying "Mmm, Mattesons smoked pork sausage... " It …
"However, although it was not sexually explicit, the innuendo was sufficiently strong to present a problem if it was heard by older children"
So totally unlike a lot of rap songs then which apparently are perfectly acceptable to broadcast when children might be listening.
What the hell is wrong with a bit of smutty innuendo?
What we really need is a Sid James Icon
**WARNING: SHOUTY COMMENT. SMALL CHILDREN AND THOSE OF A NERVOUS DISPOSITION SHOULD AVOID. OLDER CHILDREN SHOULD ALSO AVOID. IN FACT, EVERYONE SHOULD. EAT YOUR RUSKS, MUMMY WILL BURP YOU SOON.**
Seriously, WTF??? Could be a problem "if heard by older children"?? Most "older children" are more than passingly familiar with hardcore German porn FFS, I don't think a radio snippet of 'Carry On Stick Your Sausage In' is going to really corrupt them! Jesus wept, are these people on a diferent fucking planet to me? Have they not walked down a street and seen girls barely in puberty dressed up in Disney-inspired microskirts and crop-tops with a crowd of squawking morons surrounding them trying to cop a feel whilst they all yell about how wonderful blowjobs are?? I don't see how a relatively original radio ad is going to corrupt them!
Argh. It's not even noon and I need a drink....!
1) Create suitably bordeline ad
2) Get reported to the toothless watchdog that is the Advertising Standards Authority (having members of your Ad agency ring in to complain can help with this)
3) Pull the ad anyway because you don't want to spend more money on it.
4) Get lots of free coverage of the ASAs decision (whichever way it goes), in the tabloids.
Paris just because.... oh you know the rest.
for fuck's sake. Our fucking taxes are getting wasted on this shit!
A new phrase needs to be brought to bear on these complainants (which should also apply to Personal Injury blaggers): "Get a fucking grip you mithering wank-bag."
Sorry, rather a lot of swearing in this post.
Please parents Get A Life or even better yet enter your angle in a pagent where other parents are as blinkered as you are to your kids.
And parents wonder why they have to stand outside court and defend there mass murdering children "But i didn't even let them listen to the radio when they where young, so i don't understand how they could do such things".
Because we all know where inuedo on the radio can lead to.
Suggestive innuendo too much for kids?!?! What on earth did these people watch as kids themselves.
Lets protect the next generation so much they cant deal with the world at large.. Thats the governments new plan for continuing its own existence.
Flames coz we're gonna have to burn it all soon just to start again.
Those god awful adverts for cider (i think - cant remember the brand, but if anyone has heard them, they will know what I mean).
Irn bru has been doin the exact same for years and years, not exactly denting sales for them.
1. think up suitable borderline advert
2. make it 1960's smutty.
3. broadcast it when children listen
4. %$^$%^$%
5. PROFIT !
... because of all the smut and filth that's on the telly / radio / interwebs these days.
When I was a lad we had this. Not only was it broadcast at times when children might be listening, it was AIMED at children.
"If chocolate and nougat (Nugget!)
make you smile
Big One
Sticks out a (BANG!) mile
If you like your nougat (Nugget!)
To last you a while
Big One
(BANG! BANG!)
Sticks out a mile"
And did we all grow up sniggering perverts? No. Not really.
I guess the cat boil medicine you get these days just doesn't do the job like the old one used to.
I wonder how innuendo could possibly affect the kind of innocent children this was designed to save.
The whole point of innuendo is you're not explicitly saying anything naughty, you're tricking the listener into making the connections themselves, connections that your cotton-wool encased kids couldn't possibly make with their tiny uncorrupted minds.
While I'm usually against Political Correctness Gone Mad. this is a decent decision. The world is way too adultified for kids these days. Even the stuff suitable for kids isn't suitable for kids (I wouldn't take any kid to see transformers 2 for example).
This isn't 'birds and bees' natural stuff... it's dirty talk to sell sausages of all things. Can't Mattesons just make a decent sausage (from local, organic meat perhaps rather than injected water and delicious sounding 'Non-UK Beef protein casings') and win over some customers via tasting good?
lawks only knows what these 21? was it? whining Mary Whitehouse* clones would make of eric idle's Breakaway adverts from the 1970s then. Hopefully have apoplexy and die.
Sid James icon? good idea but really I think that we need a Frankie Howerd* "oo-err missus" icon!
*for the benefit of colonials - Mary Whitehouse, a whinging complaining self-righteous old trout of a God-squadder who moaned about every bit of tit and bum on telly back in the day, thankfully long shuffled off this mortal coil, would probably have been elected President in the US of A for her moralistic puritanical interfering claptrap.
*my comedy hero ever since he hilariously humiliated my mum in Blackpool in 1968!
the whole point of innuendo is it is invisible to the innocent in order to get innuendo you need to have some understanding of what it is talking about to begin with so nobody who is innocent will be offended and those offended will be victims of there own corruption
on annother note did any of you watch animanics cartoons they where FULL of inuindo and they where amed at kids
"HELLO NURSE!!!"
This attitude of not letting children hear swear words or sexual innuendos or see nude women has got to stop. Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting we go around handing out porn mags to 5 year olds, but we do need to stop worrying about it.
I'm 29. When I was 6 every kid in the playground had a full repertoire of swear words to hand. They were all familiar with fuck, shit, piss, bastard, etc, and they all used them frequently (and appropriately) when the teachers weren't around.
Likewise, every kid has at some point seen their parents naked. They already know what a naked human being looks like. Keeping them from seeing nudity isn't going to prevent anything.
Likewise, I think its extraordinarily insulting to children to everywhere to suggest even the youngest of kids would hear "where do you like to stick your saussage?" and immediately consider porking the nearest little girl.
Adults everywhere need to learn what their kids are really like before wasting time on this nonsense.
-- Richard
Why is it that the ASA continually pander to a tiny minority. 21 complaints? So IOW the vast majority of parents do not feel that these adverts could be in anyway harmful to their kids. The ASA need to be taken outside and shot, or failing that their powers need to be looked at very carefully. In particular the code needs to be rewritten so it is not open to "interpetation" (ie blatant misinterpretation) and they need to have their powers modified so that they can only apply the rules to the letter to block this "interpretation" nonsense.
There have been plenty of cases where seriously misleading and offensive adverts have been allowed to run, but gods forbid that a little innuendo should slip out.
Then there are the British Heart Foundation ads that the ASA have banned because some people found the fact that heart disease is serious quite distressing. Well of course they fucking do. That's the whole point. How are you going to get people to help your charity if your message is "Heart disease. It's a bit of a pisser."?* Which is about all the BHF have left to them after the ASA have blocked so many of their adverts.
*Apologies to Peter Kay
Applying hammerhead to nail there. Well done. "Harm" is a strong term. A small child subjected to degrading porn might be harmed (and honestly, most porn is pretty degrading) but this is different. And rubbish.
However the level of over protection from sexual anything we give children is awful. Studying shakespeare we never learnt the innuendo before A Level (english wasn't my subject I stopped after GCSE) and so as I later learnt, missed a very large chunk of the meaning of the plays out. Much ado about nothing? More like much ado about vagina (nothing being slang at the time... you get the idea). The fact we have rampant STDs and teen pregnancy is pretty much due to the lip service we give sex education because culturally it's bad to talk about. Most 16 year olds don't actually understand what genital warts or, or haven't been made to consider that the more you put it about the more likely something bad will happen. It's shameful. Compared to that sort of genuine harm, this pales into insignificance.
The only way anyone could be "harmed" by this is if they are already corrupted with worldly knowledge**, and if they have enough worldly knowledge to take this as anything other than innocent, then the corruption has already taken place and these ads cause no further damage.
As such, the idea that the ads "harm" children is utterly ridiculous and false.
** Heaven forbid that we actually allow our children to KNOW anything. Next these "Think of the children" types will be claiming that knowledge of biology, even amongst "older children" is harmful because they might get exposed to knowledge of how the natural reproductive cycles work.
Too right - I remember when even Blue Peter were at it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSO3-jKoRBQ
I've got a feeling that this was a deliberate attempt to get free marketing, and the suckers at the ASA fell for it. Innuendo only works if you understand what it's alluding to, so it's impossible to corrupt anyone this way...
That's the thing about innuendo. If you understand the references, then you've already heard a lot worse. If you don't understand the references, then you never will.
It's the dirty-minded Puritans who are the main cause of the problem. They understand the references, and therefore think that everyone has as dirty and filthy a mind as they do. Instead of letting it go, they complain because somewhere, someone might be having a good time and that can't be allowed.
This is the same kind of busy-body fuckwits who are killing the innuendo in your typical panto, and turning them into Hollywood versions of the Smurfs.
It's obvious that Britain didn't do enough to kill off its Puritans. Time for another purge, I say.
This is the same ASA who rebuffed my complaint about one of those bloody awful "The average salary in IT is £37,000 a year" adverts claiming they had seen statistics proving otherwise.
Gutless soulless... you know the Bill Hicks reference. The ASA is an outdated dinosaur in need of euthanasia
So Norman from Shireboroughbury was so incensed he and his knitwear circle complained to the ASA?
How are these people brought up? Do they go to separate schools with morality lessons or do they see career advisers who inform them, sadly of course, that the only use they could be to society would be as bespectacled moral guardians? Stupid namby-pamby closeted insecure fucks hiding behind child welfare because mummy never let them talk about their pee-pee.
Raaarrrrrrrrrgggghhhh!!!! Etc.
Is a NGO, AKA a private company that is a sop to trading standards to stop them pushing for regulation of the advertising industry.
They are a capricious bunch of idiots who tie up legit, honest advertisers (If thats not an oxymoron) who are trying to be on the right side of the regulations, whilst being a toothless, flatulent watchdog against those who really do take the p**s
AC- Yes because I have to check advertising copy to make sure its correct, and I've wasted months over the "True Meaning" of a single word.
Yes they are that petty
@ AC Posted Wednesday 22nd July 2009 10:53 GMT
"Most "older children" are more than passingly familiar with hardcore German porn"
And you don't see a problem with this?
"Have they not walked down a street and seen girls barely in puberty dressed up in Disney-inspired microskirts and crop-tops with a crowd of squawking morons surrounding them trying to cop a feel whilst they all yell about how wonderful blowjobs are?"
And you don't think this is a problem either?!
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@ imposter Posted Wednesday 22nd July 2009 14:24 GMT
"The fact we have rampant STDs and teen pregnancy is pretty much due to the lip service we give sex education because culturally it's bad to talk about."
And ads full of smutty innuendo is gonna help ... how? In fact I would disagree that culturally it's bad to talk about, everybody is talking about this stuff, it's always in your face whether you want it or not.
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@ AC Posted Wednesday 22nd July 2009 11:39 GMT
"And did we all grow up sniggering perverts? No. Not really."
Um, no? Not really? Some of the comments above suggest otherwise ...
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Seriously, none of you see ANY problem with this? Look I agree that if I was going to complain about something I'd pick on some of the more outlandish in-your-face stuff than this, but the principle is still valid. Do we REALLY want our kids exposed to this (and the rap lyrics full of sex and violence, and the billboards advertising X-rated TV programs, and on and on)?
my first morning working here in Oz was greeted with someone using an oral sex allegory as a vehicle for selling nutrient-rich, uhm, breakfast cereal. most fun my girlfriend's had on a weekday morning for a while
surely marketing agencies are now factoring in the ASA Effect
for my part, I was brought up in a Goon Show loving household, and as a preteen had to work out exactly what sort of a relationship Hercules Grytpipe-Thynne and Moriarty shared, as well as getting a cuff across the back of the head when I asked about Seagoon's Pink Oboe...
I guess the good folks at whatever the UK has to emulate (not much, I hope) our Dept. of Homeland Security have a way to prevent these fine young lads and lasses from reading el Reg, where they might have seen articles featuring model railroad figurines "doing it". In broad daylight! In a park!
Oh yeah, if hearing the ad is bad for the kiddos, can you imagine what actually eating a hundred kilos of those sausages will do to them? (quarter kilo a week for a year = 13 kilos * 8 years and we're off to the cath lab for a couple of stents).
Sausage innuendo's? Of course, these are the same people that got all hot under the collar about "where the bloody hell are you" after all.
All this stuff looks like an Enid Blyton Bedtime Story compared to the current ads running on TV here (Oz) that are spruiking feminine hygiene products under the tag line of "Be kind to your beaver" complete with actual beavers doing cute stuff in bed and on roller skates or whatever.
What a bunch of pansies you guys are in old blighty.
Paris, because her beaver is in perfect working order I'm sure.
So a simply radio advert is now resposible for teens watching German Porn, STD's , Dressing up like red light works and becoming sniggering perverts. I surpose you wouldn't blame any of this on the parents though (as i'm guessing your angle is pure and innocent) and here lies the problem people like you thinking all the children need protecting from the world by banning everything.
Nice attitude i bet your also happy that the police can arrest you for not proving your innocent went stoppped in the streets for having a camera.
With your morality we should also ban as people have commented all Carry on films, 'allo 'allo, anything with Franky Howard in and every panto in the land.
Or i could be just feding a troll, oh well may make him feel inportant for several seconds.
I don't really care about this ruling, but Gray has some interesting points. How many people here are actually fathers (or mothers) and can speak from a position of a bit more informed knowledge?
With respect to carry on films and 'allo 'allo etc, you know what you are getting when you sit down to watch them and the parents can make an informed decision about letting their kids watch, with an advert you can't. That's it, end of. You may want your kids to be exposed to this sort of innuendo, but rightly or wrongly not all parents do. It's not so much the content as the placing of that content.
I have no qualms with my kids hearing stuff like this, or even seeing a tv-advertisment with some housewife stirring the boiling sausages saucily. I would draw the line at definite porn in advertisements though (total nudity, stiff appendages for example).
Is it possible to complain about advertisements that do not include enough innuendo? They apparently received 21 complaints about too much innuendo. What if they got 50 complaints that the innuendo was too weak?
"@ AC Posted Wednesday 22nd July 2009 10:53 GMT
"Most "older children" are more than passingly familiar with hardcore German porn"
And you don't see a problem with this?
"Have they not walked down a street and seen girls barely in puberty dressed up in Disney-inspired microskirts and crop-tops with a crowd of squawking morons surrounding them trying to cop a feel whilst they all yell about how wonderful blowjobs are?"
And you don't think this is a problem either?!"
I never said I don't think those are problems. In fact, I believe I was implying exactly the opposite - that those are the problems that *should* be addressed, as opposed to a radio ad with some mild innuendo, which is going to, at most, bounce off the kids we've allowed to go so far (*snigger*) without taking adequate precaustions ("fnar*)....
Back when TV was black and white and Benny Hill was still funny (yes really) he did a sketch which was a spoof documentary. In one clip Hill played an old lady school teacher talking about a badly behaved child in her class:
Hill: "And there were the dirty songs in class."
Interviewer: "He sings dirty songs in class?"
Hill: "No he whistles them."
And that's the point about innuendo. It's only dirty if you think it's dirty.
No, I didn't say that the radio ad is "responsible for teens watching German Porn, STD's , Dressing up like red light works and becoming sniggering perverts". Try re-reading ALL of the comments, including the ones I was responding to. It's called putting things in context.
@ AC Thursday 23rd July 2009 13:53 GMT
"In fact, I believe I was implying exactly the opposite - that those are the problems that *should* be addressed"
Agree 100%, it just didn't come across to me that's what you were saying.
(Hmmm ... maybe *I* should try re-reading all of the comments, and putting things in context ...)
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