{"id":92670,"date":"2015-07-08T11:21:12","date_gmt":"2015-07-08T09:21:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=92670"},"modified":"2015-07-08T11:21:31","modified_gmt":"2015-07-08T09:21:31","slug":"cheeky-cell-c-advert-crass-but-not-offensive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/92670\/cheeky-cell-c-advert-crass-but-not-offensive\/","title":{"rendered":"Cheeky Cell C advert crass, but not offensive: ASA"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Cell C recently launched an advertisement which features a dog &#8216;humping&#8217; a man\u2019s leg every time he\u00a0is taken advantage of.<\/p>\n<p>Following its release, it attracted a massive number of complaints at the Advertising Standards Authority of South Africa (ASA).<\/p>\n<p>The ASA said some of the complaints argued that the commercial was offensive due to its sexual content.<\/p>\n<p>Complainants said a dog performing a sexual act is unsuitable for children to be exposed to, while others raised concerns about possible animal cruelty.<\/p>\n<p>Advertising agency FCB Joburg responded on behalf of Cell C, arguing that children would not be able to understand the link between the dog\u2019s behaviour and a person being \u201ctaken advantage of\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It added that Cell C always intended for the ad to be flighted after 20:30, but a \u201csports package\u201d it bought resulted in unintentional audience spillover.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/CZQkDd2QROI\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Offending against \u201cgood taste and decency\u201d<\/h3>\n<p>The ASA said that although some people might find the commercial crass, it is satisfied that the obvious metaphor would not be lost on the average consumer.<\/p>\n<p>It found that the ad was not in contravention of the offence clause in the advertising code.<\/p>\n<p>On the issue of the commercial being inappropriate for children, the ASA accepted Cell C\u2019s undertaking to only flight the ad after the so-called \u201cwatershed period\u201d \u2013\u00a0between 20:00 and 05:00 on subscription TV services, and 21:00 and 05:00 on free-to-air TV.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Animal cruelty<\/h3>\n<p>Regarding the claims of animal cruelty, Cell C submitted a film welfare compliance certificate which said that shooting of the commercial was done under inspection of an animal welfare inspector.<\/p>\n<p>It went on to assure that a real dog wasn\u2019t used to perform the \u201chumping\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The ASA subsequently\u00a0dismissed all complaints, and reminded Cell C to only air the ad during the watershed period.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">More on Cell C<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/90068\/cell-c-in-talks-to-boost-network-quality\/\"><strong>Cell C in talks to boost network quality<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/89156\/cell-c-needs-more-money\/\">Cell C needs more money<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/84615\/cell-c-to-spend-r8-billion-on-lte-network\/\"><strong>Cell C to spend R8 billion on LTE network<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/86780\/cell-c-restructuring-could-see-job-cuts-union\/\">Cell C restructuring could see job cuts: union<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Advertising Standards Authority of South Africa has dismissed complaints against Cell C\u2019s latest video commercial.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":91080,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[4094,2170,42,26],"class_list":["post-92670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-advertising-standards-authority-of-south-africa","tag-asa","tag-cell-c","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92670"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92670\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92678,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92670\/revisions\/92678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}