The Advertising Standards Authority, the government agency in charge of monitoring ads released on television, magazines, and public posters and billboards in the UK, has banned a poster for Sony's Move and the game The Fight: Light's Out. The ad was banned after the agency received eight complaints - two of which strongly objected to one of the men being tackled being "black." The ASA said that the ad features men of "slightly different skin tones" but did not ban the ad based on those complaints..
Instead the ASA banned the ad because it could "condone or encourage violent behavior" in children. Of course, playing in the schoolyard could also encourage the same kind of behavior..
The poster for the campaign showed a man in three different poses, throwing punches, and appearing closer in each pose. The largest pose - the final one in the set - showed a man putting another man in a headlock with his arm raised and ready to punch the other man in the face.
The caption underneath the picture reads "Move into the fight £34.99 RRP! PlayStation move, the game is just the start…"
Source: Joystiq and Band Republic
Comments
Re: UK ASA Bans The Fight: Lights Out Poster
Needs more floaty pink frills......
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Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Let's renegotiate them.
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Re: UK ASA Bans The Fight: Lights Out Poster
Instead the ASA banned the ad because a bunch of interfering zealots started whining that it could "condone or encourage violent behavior" in children. -Fixed.
Seriously, I have more faith in the nation's kids than to think that they would copy what they see on a promotional poster. In fact, that's downright insulting. It's too bad that the ASA believe that tripe and can't tell it's just something the complainants dislike.
Although, the posters and adverts are in public places and broadcast media. The content of the game is none of their business since your have to actively buy it and play it in order to view the content, whereas there is no opt-in for the adverts so advertisers should take care not to offend people. But that still doesn't mean it was the right decision to ban the ads.
Re: UK ASA Bans The Fight: Lights Out Poster
If I recall correctly eight people complained. Eight. In the whole country. So an entire country changed due to eight old bitties. And guess what? If a million people complain about it? So what.
-Ultimately what will do in mankind is a person's fear of their own freedom-
Re: UK ASA Bans The Fight: Lights Out Poster
but each complaint represents a billion people so over 8 billion people were offended.