Robert Kirby
CHANNELVISION
Can there have been a more gratifying triumph than that of Nando’s over the humourless prissmongers who succeeded in having the now famous guide-dog television commercial canned? God save me from ever praising an advertising outfit, but to Hunt Lascaris I bow my head in honour, especially for the way they came back with the new “sanitised” version.
By now you will probably have seen it. It is the original guide-dog commercial up until the moment critique, just short of the dreaded lamp-post. At this point the action freezes and a sarcastic caption announces that the Directorate of Good Taste has insisted that the advertisement carry a happy ending. Cut to a couple dancing in a field to the tune of Sleepy Lagoon, a sweet border collie puppy romps in slow motion (putting in the dog was a stroke of wicked genius), a couple hug in a kitsch sunset. It is a wonderful send-up of every sentimental clich of the commercials business.
All of which goes to prove that the most corrosive social development of the late 20th century is political correctness. Above all other perceived sins, the PC brigade loathe humour. It’s the one thing their sticky little minds will never understand. As was again proved in the Nando’s brouhaha, Big Brother has been replaced by Big Person.
What was even better was watching the tables turned with such efficiency. Nando’s could never have dreamed of such excellent publicity and, despite the oily statements made by one of its managers, the comeback advert proffers a very erect finger to not only the feeble-minded protesters but more accurately to that carpetbag of hypocrisy, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).
Why, I would wonder, does the ASA get so anal about something like the Nando’s ad but steadfastly look in the other direction in many other instances where equally “offensive” material is used by the ad agencies?
I hereby formally place before the ASA the following complaints about television commercials which give entirely the wrong impression about animals or which portray animals and people in an undignified light or which blatantly promote cruelty towards animals or which insult males.
Let’s start with that unfortunate white mouse which was forced to climb up and down the steering wheel of a luxury motor car in order to demonstrate how easily the wheel turns. I cannot imagine what callous training techniques were employed to make this hapless rodent do such unnatural things. Where was the ASA?
Next, what about those two perfectly innocent tourist-attracting ostriches who have their feathers stripped off them by the squall of air generated by a passing car? Surely these unsophisticated creatures do not deserve being unclothed in this way on national television.
One of the worst examples of malevolent television advertising is the oft- repeated scene where a fisherman boasts about the size of some wretched grouper he had once caught. In order to underline his gloating he flips open his state-of- the-art cellphone and, by heavens, there’s an actual picture of the murdered fish. This commercial only depicts male fishermen as insensitive and malicious. Women also assassinate fish. The ASA were previously quite prepared to ban an anti- rape ad on the grounds that it represented men unfairly.
Worst of all in recent memory is that quite horrendous commercial in which the family cat slaughters a defenceless canary. Why, I demand from the ASA, should this musical avian life form be sacrificed in order to flog a copying machine?
There are many other examples: the offence that might well be felt by members of the homosexual community at the commercial involving the cross- dressing sheep; the affecting lion that had porcupine quills driven into its paw; the terrified boxer which has to ride along with its show-off macho owners in the back of a bakkie. What about that moron who tears around the countryside with a suffocating trout? Let’s hear the ASA’s strident compassion sing out about these ones.
As I’m in a more than usually didactic mood this week, the following tips are offered at no charge. To whoever produced last week’s Special Assignment I humbly inform: the word “granite” is pronounced GRAN-IT, with the stress on the first syllable. It is never ever pronounced GRAN-NIGHT.
To e.tv news-writers and readers. The word “knots” when used in relation to speed, means nautical miles per hour. You sound and look extremely foolish when you say “knots per hour” as you did last Thursday.