‘Depraved’ Patties Pies ad is finger-licking good, says ad board
An ad featuring a man and boy tussling over the last Patties Pie has been cleared by the Ad Standards Board despite a complaint that it was “depraved” because the man licks his hand and wipes it on the food.
The complaint said:
“I believe it is Disgusting Filthy & Unhealthy.
“No person Young or Old shoul be looking at such advertisement. The Management in my opinion should have more sense & responsibility & examine all T/V advertisements before going on air. Then this Filthy type of advertising would not be considered.
“I am well into my 80″”s & have never felt so Disgusted with t/V advertisement as I feel wi9th this one in fact I feel sick every time it appears on screen.
“The man licks his fingers and wipes over the top of the pie and bargains with the boy. The man looks ‘seedy’ and the whole atmosphere of the ad is unpleasant. I would but those pies if I was starving !!
“It’s also the sheer unapologetic disgracefulness of the man’s actions – it made me feel ill watching him languish over putting his saliva all over the top of a party pie. Really depraved and not something I would ever want to see on Australian TV again.”
The ASB ruled: “The Board noted that in order to be certain of getting the last pie, the man in the advertisement licks his fingers and then wipes them across the top of the pie. The Board considered that this is intended to be a humorous incident that represents the type of thing that friends and family will do when teasing each other.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
Linkedin
Commons sense is WINNER.
Old Lady is LOSER.
GTFO old lady.
User ID not verified.
“…The board also noted that batsh*t crazy old ladies now seem to bae able to use the internet.”
User ID not verified.
Kid should’ve said “give me the pie or I’ll tell my mum you touched me down there”.
That would’ve given the crazy old lady something to REALLY get on her high horse about.
User ID not verified.
If you read the complaint, he goes to say he is a grandfather. So not so much “crazy old lady”, but interesting how everyone jumped to that stereotype.
User ID not verified.
I’ve only ever had to deal with one of these complaints as an advertiser and it was a massive waste of time. What happens if the advertiser just ignores it?
User ID not verified.
Grumpy Old Man!
User ID not verified.
@Che, I immediately assumed the writer was a grumpy old man. Dunno why, just the overall tone….good to see my jumping on the stereotype was at least accurate. 🙂
User ID not verified.
I greatly resemble that seedy guy. A win for all seedy looking guys!
User ID not verified.
Wait ’til he sees the Doritos Superbowl ad…
User ID not verified.
Some people really need to get jobs……
User ID not verified.
“…The man looks ‘seedy’ and the whole atmosphere of the ad is unpleasant.” Never mind the people posting here refering to stereo types (Grumpy old man, Crazy old lady), the complaintant has himself jumped to a stereo type.
When I see this ad, I see a couple of smart arses (like me) trying to outsmart each other, not a seedy man. But to old people, mature males talking to younger males must equal seedy? Hmmmm, only if your brain is already thinking that way perhaps, ‘Grumpy old man’?
This is why the Howard govt really wanted old people to work beyond 65, not because of the welfare burden, but because these people wouldn’t have all this spare time to waste on baseless complaints like this…
User ID not verified.
I knew a bloke once that if he bought food that could be shared e.g. hot chips, he would make sure people saw him spitting on them so they wouldn’t want any! Then he would say “go ahead if you still want some”
This old bloke would probably deficate in his pants and have a coronary if he saw that!
User ID not verified.
This is getting ridiculous. The ASB says “A single written complaint is sufficient to initiate a formal investigation.” Since when is 1 a sufficient sample size for anything?
There should be a minimum number of complaints before ads get reviewed. A decent amount that at least tries to reflect the pervading mood. I suggest 100, which is approx. 0.0005% of the population.
If 100 people can be bothered complaining, then it’s probably offensive. If not, most people clearly don’t care.
User ID not verified.
“probably offensive”? Do you mean very remotely possibly offensive?
User ID not verified.
I agree with the old man… there you go, two complaints now! BTW, I’m not an old man or an old woman.
User ID not verified.
@ Anonymous at 4th Feb 6.01
You are obviously not a grumpy old man or a grumpy old woman. You are clearly just a grumpy man or woman…
User ID not verified.
Out of the hundreds of forgettable regional ads I’ve made, two were complained about.
Going through the process and justifying the material made me more aware of the sensitivities of the public and more careful in the future.
One complaint did come from a rival in the market, which did highlight the fact to me that if someone really had it in for you, it wouldn’t be too hard to feign outrage at anything and make your week totally shit.
User ID not verified.
Come on the ad is funny
This is a baseless complaint.
As someone whose ad’s have been complained of a few times to the ASB (both dismissed), there are a lot of the more mature segment out there with way too much time on their hands
User ID not verified.
Hucking fell, there seems to be no shortage of these ‘Outraged of Thirroul’ types who all feel the need to ‘write a letter to the editor’ or in this case the ASB. FFS do old people lose all sense of humour? Not looking forward to geting older if so.
User ID not verified.
There needs to be a mechanism where those of us who like an ad can have our vote recorded in anticipation of the complaints from fundies/wowsers. Remember the ad some years ago for cake mix where the two little girls were eating cakes and one was saying how her Mum says the most important ingredient is that it be made with love etc., and the other kid responds with “My Mum says your Mum needs to get a life”? I saw that ad a few times and totally loved it, then noticed a few days later the ending had been changed. Obviously someone (I’m thing of the stereotypical women from the Jacobs Creek ads mentioned elsewhere) decided to take offense. You can’t legislate against stupid, but we should at least be able to celebrate clever.
User ID not verified.