Please keep it in your paper
July 30, 2006 ~ 11:17 a.m.
A friend of mine recently informed me via e-mail about an advertisement that ran in his local newspaper with copy that read, "She wants better sex." He didn't elaborate on what the ad was really about, but said that it resulted in an angry letter to the editor denouncing the ad's copy and arguing that it crossed the line between freedom of speech and public lewdness. My friend wonders, where do you cross the line?
Common sense should prevail among companies or organizations who make the advertisements in the first place. In most cases, controversial material is avoided as it's not a good idea to offend the public upon whom you rely to take an interest in the company's product or service. However, some advertisers think controversy is a great way to attract attention.
I remember the case involving an AIDS Action Committee advertisement that ran on Boston subways and busses throughout 1993. One ad showed a packaged condom next to copy that read, in large bold print, "Tell him you don't know how it will fit!" At the time, I wrote that this crossed the line as it subjected the general public to the sort of sensitivities that you'd normally only find in an adult magazine. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) orginally argued that the ads could be defended on the grounds of free speech, but eventually withdrew the ads, forcing the AIDS Action Committee to be more select with the content of their advertisements.
It could be argued that the AIDS Action Committee advertisements were performing a vital public service. True enough. However, the controversy that particular ad courted should have been avoided. After all, you may not get sympathy from some quarters by throwing references to pornography and/or sexual promiscuity in their faces. (And isn't sexual promiscuity the sole reason why the AIDS epidemic exploded in the first place?) Indeed, don't some members of the general public have the right to not be bombarded by material of this sort? And how exactly are such explicit ads good for children?
Besides, the "me generation" of the 1970s never went away. Most people think they have the right to do whatever they want, that there should be no constraints on personal freedom whatsoever�regardless of just what that personal freedom entails. As far as some people are concerned, performing necrophilia on park benches should be allowed because who are they really harming? (Their partners certainly aren't complaining!) Talk to most people about public decency and they might very well reply, "Hey, I got your public decency right here, pal!" Whose sensitivites should we be conscious of and honor, and which ones should we reject on the basis of encouraging open-mindedness? It's a tricky subject.
I work in advertising these days, organizing and classifying ads for a media company and I come across some real humdingers. For instance, RyanAir recently published an ad that referred the slide of their market rival, Aer Lingus, paying special attention to the defection of Aer Lingus chairman Willy Walsh to RyanAir's side. The copy? "First they lost their balls. Now they've lost their Willy." (In British/Irish slang, "willy" is a penis.) I laughed out loud when I came across that one. But why did that not offend me when the AIDS advertisement did? Wasn't it just as sexually explicit? The answer is yes, perhaps it was, and the cheap shot should have been avoided. But it did make for some damn clever copy and RyanAir, which has a history of cranking out humorous ad lines, certainly got noticed.
But here's the small detail I'm leaving out: These advertisements appeared in newspapers like The Times and The Guardian, which are generally safer and more legitimate venues for ads that pack a punch. RyanAir did not plaster these ads on the London Underground or London buses, which would have given the ads a lot more exposure, but thusly have created an environment in which the question would re-arise: Is this freedom of speech or public lewdness?
I think it's safe to say that if the arena for explicit ads is a newspaper, then that's fine�as long as the editor agrees to publishing them. After all, you also see ads for charities in newspapers too, ones that tug at the heartstrings and which people could point to on the grounds that it saddened and ruined their day. Not exactly a reason to ban them as they highlight important issues. The AIDS Action Committee should have stuck to a newspaper format only for its condom ads, and while the center-right Boston Herald would probably not have published them, the Left-liberal Boston Globe and alternative Boston Phoenix certainly would have�as well as all the college newspapers such as the one I was working for at the time. But public transport, or any other public venue for that matter, is not the place for explicit ads. Again, if you pay your 75 cents (or 50p) for a newspaper, expect to read things you disagree with, whether it be an editorial or an advertisement.
But you should not expect to see your Willy referred to on street corners or the Tube.
� M.E.M.
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Copyright � 2001-2007 by M.E. Manning. All material is written by me, unless explicitly stated otherwise by use of footnotes or bylines. Do not copy or redistribute without my permission.
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