As suggested on a previous thread, lets all complain at the stupid ruling about the MG advert.
If you go into the ASA web site (asa.org.uk) they have acomplaints form which I have filled in with the following comment
"I am complaining about your ruling regarding the MG advertisment.
You are upholding a spurious complaint against a company that is doing it's best to keep the British motor industry going, provide jobs and even help the balance of payments.
I now require you to reverse this decision on the basis that I find your ruling distasteful and against the national and public interest."
If we use the e mail link it goes through to inquiries and will probably be buried. If we use the complaints form they must take notice
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Many thanks for Alyn for this. I've installed a link to the ASA direct from the news-item, but haven't been able to test it because, not surprisingly, the ASA's server has a hang-up.
HJ
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Done it. Text as follows:
I wish to protest most strongly against the ASA's decision to uphold a complaint against MG Rover in respect of their recent advertising campaign. It should not be the job of the ASA to seek to prevent manufacturers of sports cars from advertising their sportiness. There is nothing in any of MG Rover's recent advertisements that could give offence to any reasonable individual, and even after very carefully studying the adverts in question, I can see no way in which they could be construed as encouraging reckless driving or excessive speed.
I fear that the ASA is being used as the unwitting tool of anti-car pressure groups, with a corrosive effect on an important section of British industry. The energy which MG Rover's management have been forced to put into responding to this latest ruling would have been better spent in working to secure the long term future of the company, and the hundreds of thousands of jobs whose future depends on the company's prosperity.
Yours sincerely
Richard Hall
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what about the old advert of a car flying through the air because it had just gone over a hump backed bridge, i think that advert was worse than the MG one.
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also i think they should ban things like the tampax adverts, if this sort of thing has to go out, let it go out after 9pm. sorry but thats how i feel. its just that i remember the days of adverts that dont do anything like the ones out these days, those were the days (theme from the hovis advert).
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"also i think they should ban things like the tampax adverts"
You are so crass (stupid and insensitive).
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Stu wrote:
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> "also i think they should ban things like the tampax adverts"
>
> You are so crass (stupid and insensitive).
[This was in response to something CW (ladas are cool) submitted to this thread.]
Stu, I totally disagree with what Chris is saying. But I do defend his right to have that opinion. He might have found somewhere else than a motoring forum to express it, but it is certainly in context, since we're discussing the remit of the ASA.
And sorry to have to say this, but I'd rather we didn't do slanging matches here either.
Martyn
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sorry martyn, i was just trying to show people that ASA put all sort of adverts on, and if they let tampax adverts on then they should let fast car adverts on, i didnt mean to offend anybody, i am very sorry everyone.
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this is just my opinion, i didnt mean to offend you.
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ladas are cool wrote:
>
> this is just my opinion, i didnt mean to offend you.
I don't think what you put was offensive. It might have been wrong-headed and I do in fact disagree with you. But I certainly take the point your making. So no need to apologise.
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Come on everybody - there are loads of regular posters on here and this is an important issue (which amazingly we all seem to agree on!):
We have an entire advertising campaign having been removed on the say-so of one anti-motorist type who clearly has a vendetta of some kind. Whether you like Rover cars or not is not the point here (though bear in mind how many jobs these guys have saved by managing to buy the place and start to turn it around) but the fact that if this is not complained about now and the ASA's actions questionned then this is going to be the future of things to come.
Come on - get to the site www.asa.org.uk go to Complaints Form and get it filled in. They HAVE to read your comments and respond to them accordingly.
My two penneth:
"My complaint is not actually about the above advert, but ASA's ruling on it:
I am thoroughly disgusted by the ruling on the MG advert and wish to protest strongly against the ASA's decision to uphold a complaint against MG Rover in respect of their recent advertising campaign. For exactly what reason has this advert been forced to be withdrawn? We live in a country where there is a population of 60 million yet you find it acceptable to remove an advert on the basis of one person - this I would like you to explain to me. I find it unbelievable that advertising during children's television time is permitted yet I don't complain about it because that is the way things are. If we lived in a society where nothing was permitted that cause offence to anybody at all then there would be no media whatsoever, and certainly no advertising.
I have studied the adverts and find absolutely nothing that could cause offence there - there is certainly nothing which suggests the cars should be driven recklessly. It would appear that the ASA is pandering to the anti-motorist minority and I find that unacceptable. It was my mind that the ASA was put in place to ensure that advertisers were subject to a code of conduct and if they produced an advert which was offensive and upset many people they had the power to have it removed. It seems, however, that the ASA has merely become a tool for which over-sensitive individuals with a vendetta can cause trouble to companies who do not need it.
The saving of Rover for Great Britain was an important landmark. Tens of thousands of jobs have been saved because of it and the company is slowly managing to turn itself around. Do you find it acceptable that the feelings of one individual person can jeopordise tens of thousands of jobs? Clearly so...
I would like a response to this complaint from yourselves. Given you have undertaken to have an entire advertising campaign removed on the complaint of one single person I see no reason why I should not receive one.
I look forward to your response and expect some justification as to your actions.
Regards,
Daniel Jeffery"
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Perhaps we should consider complaining about the new Vauxhall Zafira ad!
The one where a chap in a Zafira pulls up outside a school gate, kids get in (not his!) and he whisks them away for a 'fast' spin.
In this instance he does have the grace to return them after.
This should have the pervs queing up at their local Vauxhall dealer!
How this got passed the 'do-gooders' beggars belief!
Dave K
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Done it and sent it to their inquiries e-mail address.
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Whilst visiting to register my displeasure, I noticed that Vauxhall had received the same complaint over the Astra SRi advert, though that one was not upheld.
10 bucks says it was the same complainant. And that he/she spends all day, every day, reviewing every car advert to be found trying to work out whether there is space to complain again.
Don't you just wish they had to publish the name/address of the complaining party ?
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Really makes you mad, doesn't it? You're probably right, it is probably some unemployed wretch who, when not causing damage to the construction of new motorways, insists on complaining about every single car advert available.
Still, I bet the ASA who take notice of each complaint (which is probably only a few words different each time) seriously bins the lot of ours...
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I have just sent in this complaint and wonder how "independently" it will be dealt with:
Ad: Speed Kills
When Seen: Various times, including on the back of bus whilst being dangerously undertaken by it.
Complaint:
As a motorist I find these advertisements grossly offensive, implying, as they do, that motorists kill.
The "average" motorist, statistically, has to drive tens, if not hundreds of millions of miles to kill. But only because homicidal maniacs are allowed out on the streets and are allowed to have access to road transport. If they are taken out of the equation: the average motorist DOESN'T kill, regardless of their speed. And therefore Speed DOESN'T Kill.
Secondly, I object to the advertisements as being totally factually incorrect. Speed does NOT kill. This is a fallacy propagated in the early days of rail. Along with your head will fall off and milk will go sour. It is just as fatuous. The fastest people on (?) earth are astronauts, and I do not recall any of them being killed by speed, or killing others with speed. And the safest form of public transport is by air, which is also the fastest.
Finally I object on the grounds of public policy and public safety.
The advertisements give the impression that it is safe to step out right in front of a car doing 30mph.
That it is acceptable to loiter or jaywalk on a street with vehicles at, or even over the urban speed limit.
That it is a drivers responsibility (not a pedestrians) to ensure that pedestrians are safe.
That pedestrians do not need to concern themselves with road safety.
And that a car doing 30 can stop almost instantly, and one doing (if I recall correctly, 37) in a fraction of it's actual stopping distance.
I look forward to seeing these offensive, misleading and dangerous ads withdrawn.
Can you assure me that the advertisers will be instructed to display retractions of equal size and prominence warning children that playing in the road kills, and that crossing the road within 120 feet of a car doing 40 mph will result in it hitting them.
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Sent this email too:
Dear Sirs
It has been brought to my attention that car advertisements are being banned
because, for example, they depict cars with blurred wheels giving the
impression that they are rotating. Or against a blurred background, impling
tha they are capable of motion.
I would appreciate your comments on the following:
The basic principles of the Codes are that advertisements should be:
a) legal, decent, honest and truthful
Surely if a car is depicted as incapable of motion or of having non rotating
wheels this is not "decent, honest and truthful" and so should be illegal?
And surely if a fast, sporty car has been produced, and it is advertised as
slow and unresponsive to the accelerator then this is not only NOT "decent,
honest and truthful" but DANGEROUS and so NOT:
b) prepared with a sense of responsibility to consumers and to society
Surely if a car is misrepresented, then this shows a LACK of "a sense of
responsibility to consumers and to society"?
c) in line with the principles of fair competition generally accepted in
business
Surely if a car is produced to compete with an established brand with a
particular image, say a sporting one, and that new, competing, car is not
allowed to advertise the attributes on which it will compete in its niche
market, say sporty coupe's, then that is NOT "in line with the principles of
fair competition generally accepted in business"!
I won't hold my breath waiting for a reasoned reply.
Anyone got the details of any "boring" car ads that could reasonably be accused of being misleading and potentially dangerous by lulling the public (potential purchasers and pedestrians alike) into thinking that they are slow and sluggish?
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In fact: what would happen if everytime they received a complaint calling for the banning of a car ad for showing it as too fast, they got a sackfull of mail complaining that it illegally, indecently, dishonestly and untruthfully depicted the car as slower than it was and so was not prepared with a sense of responsibility to consumers and to society, and broke the principles of fair competition generally accepted in business by trying to gain an unfair and unjustified advantage over honestly advertised slower, and so safer, cars ;-)
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I just had a look on th asa web site, and it appears the complaint wasn't upheld.
Gotta be honest, I subscribe to ntl, and... er.. I don't recall the advert. oophs sorry MG advertising guru's.
But I like the thread.
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