Ad Priorities

I am, it is fairly safe to say, not a fan of advertising. In fact, I usually find it shallow, depressing and repetitive. I've already blogged generally about LGBT issues and advertising, and often refer to Charlie Brooker's excellent Screenwipe on advertising (on YouTube in three parts here, here and here). But the other day I saw an ad which annoyed, frustrated and depressed me more than a thousand "Go Compare" singers ever could.



Yes, if there was ever any doubt, beauty is entirely skin deep. But it doesn't stop at that, because happiness is directly proportional to how attractive you are. And, of course, we can make you more attractive. All it takes is to lop a bit off here, suck a bit out of there, and Hey Presto! You now conform to everything you've been told is beautiful, because that's the only beauty there is!

This is nothing new in advertising. Every advert for a beauty product suggests that, by using it, you can become a happier or more popular person. But this one is remarkably upfront, about something so incredibly drastic, and it's hard not to worry about the repercussions of an industry which finds this permissible. The token male doesn't detract from the heavy-handedness of it either.

Women seem to get the worse end of the deal whichever gender the advert is aimed at. Men's adverts have always used sexual images to promote their products, equating semi-naked women with everything from deodorant to video games(once rather tactlessly described by someone I knew as suggesting a "Buy One Get One Free" deal). Yet adverts aimed at women promote stick-thin models as an ideal that you SHOULD be living up to.

I don't know how long this cosmetic surgery advert has been showing, how often it has been seen, or even if it has attracted any complaints. I caught it one evening on some digital channel. However, I was aware of a storm of complaints around this advert:


So this advert is offensive? All it seems to offer is some images of women in contemplation, then a web address which offers more information. The word "abortion" is not even mentioned in the advert, let alone depicted or promoted. The ASA recognised this, concluding that:

...the ad was for an advice service for women dealing with an unplanned pregnancy, and stated that Marie Stopes could help women who were 'pregnant and not sure what to do'. We considered it was an ad for a general pregnancy advice service for women who wished to learn about and discuss their options, which might include, but were not limited to, abortion.

Yet still the mainstream media focus on the complaints this advert receives, and so instead of offering women the information and choices they may need, we're left with identical women obsessing on hair, make-up and pro-biotic yoghurt.

Bryant v Burley

There is always the danger, when you have an opinion, of allowing that opinion to influence your viewpoint. For instance, I think that Rupert Murdoch and his affiliated publications are hideously biased politically towards a side I disagree with. I know that the News of the World, one of those publications, is currently under scrutiny thanks to allegations of phone-hacking. I also know that Sky News is, in part, owned by Murdoch.

All this leaves me open to the suggestion that Sky News would provide poor coverage of this story. Indeed, they, along with most of the mainstream media, provided no coverage of it the day The Guardian broke the story, and only relented when it became too big to deny. But, as Kay Burley points out in the clip, as a journalist she is there to provide the opposite side of the argument. It is only that she performs this badly that it is worthy of criticism.

The first problem is her demand for evidence. This is normally a perfectly reasonable demand, except for the fact that all the evidence has been out in public for a while (see Jack of Kent's blogpost for details), and, as an interviewee, it's a little unfair to ask him for all the figures when he doesn't have them to hand.

Nevertheless, the interview then progresses. Burley asks Bryant if he is prepared to make a controversial claim. A claim that he had already made before he was interrupted by Burley asking for evidence. If nothing else, it's poor journalism to ask an interviewee merely to repeat the same point over and over again.

Since Paxman's famous interview with Michael Howard, in which he continued to ask if Howard the same question without getting a straight answer, it seems that all journalists think they can badger their way to the truth. Burley is not alone in this, and neither is it limited to politics. Fabio Capello was badgered by a journalist minutes after England's draw with the USA in the FIFA World Cup as to the future of goalkeeper Robert Green. When Capello rightly argued it was too early to make a firm decision, the point continued to be brought up.

The biggest problem with Burley's "Devil's Advocate" argument is that she tries to make a dismissive comment without phrasing it as a question. Her assertion that Bryant should merely change his PIN and there would be no problem is immediately countered, despite the fact that she was clearly trying to move on to another topic. Of course, the fact that she seemed to be defending the concept of phone-hacking itself, rather than the fact that these are just allegations, is also disturbing.

So, is it journalistic bias, or just being "dim"? It's difficult to say objectively. However, whichever is the case, it's not the first time that Kay Burley has shown herself to be astonishingly poor at conducting an interview. If only there could have been protesters behind this interview...

5 Minutes with the Pope

I've been meaning to do a blog on the Pope UK visit for some time now, but this article in the New Humanist has finally inspired me to get around to it. So, if I had five minutes with the Pope, this is what I would like to say:

Pope Benedict, may I assume, for a second, that there is no God -- the primary justification for your actions and your position of authority. If this is the case, you have made women second class citizens and homosexuals outcasts for no reason. You have helped to spread HIV/AIDS by condemning condoms on the basis of a myth. And people in your organisation (and, if many reports are to be believed, you yourself) have covered up child molesters to protect the reputation of a lie. Given these countless millions who have suffered or have been killed, how is it that you can be regarded as a figure of moral authority, and how can you say, with the complete confidence that it would require, that you have acted justly?

I believe that this is the closest I can come to expressing my disgust at the actions of the Catholic Church, but I will never be able to put into words the horror and sadness that I feel, knowing that there are millions of people who hold this hateful, bigoted, misogynistic homophobe in the highest regard possible.

Reclaiming Hunt

It's often nice when people admit that they've made a mistake, such as Bjorn Lomborg's views on climate change. Sadly, Tony Blair's regrets seem not to focus on the disaster of Iraq (which they really should), but on the Hunting Ban.

Now, I am undeniably biased on the subject of fox hunting, since, as a vegetarian, I am never happy about anything to do with death. However, I do appreciate that foxes can be a problem, and so need to be controlled.

This does not mean that hunting is the best way to go about it. In fact, I can't see how it can help in the long term at all. It seems common knowledge that the hunters only catch the weaker foxes, and so the stronger foxes survive. Surely, therefore, this is only going to breed stronger, better, faster foxes. During a discussion on this topic on Twitter with Dr Evan Harris (with whom I disagree on this issue, if few others) and others, I put this point to him, and he offered an appropriate parallel, likening it to the more resilient bacteria that have formed because of anti-biotics.

I'm not proposing that fox hunting is breeding super-foxes, but I would argue that it therefore does not qualify as an effective form of pest control. If it does not, then what other excuse is there for it? All that remains is a large group cheerfully enjoying the slaughter of an animal.

Tony Blair's regret, however, seems shallow and misplaced, whatever your views on hunting. None of his regret seems to centre around his actions, but around other people's reactions. His remorse seems to lie with the fact that he got into "trouble for it". I find it incredibly depressing that, rather than have any conviction on a subject that means a great deal to both sides, he seems to care more about how he comes out of this than with the issues.