The Advertising Standards Authority has dismissed another complaint about a Love Your Condom billboard. Ad campaigns from the New Zealand AIDS Foundation’s safe sex promoting arm, and its predecessor Get It On!, have attracted a steady stream of complaints. However the complaints are regularly dismissed by the ad watchdog. The latest is about Love Your Condom’s ‘getting in the ring’ campaign which features a picture of a boxer. The complainant says “‘ring’ is a slang word for anus and is offensive. I also want to know how this billboard is explained to children who read it.” They continue “sure, promote condoms to gay people, but do it with decency and don't subject everyone to the use of such language … I am not anti-gay, I am anti slogans that have explicit messages…” The Advertising Standards Authority says the billboard sells an important public health message to help reduce the rate of HIV infections within New Zealand. It says the ad does not reach the threshold to be considered “explicit,” despite the obvious association with anal sex and that “the double entendre was of a level that would not be readily understood by most children”.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Monday, 20th April 2015 - 12:37pm