Sydney Mardi Gras postcard ‘exploitative, degrading and highly sexualised’ rules ad watchdog
The Advertising Standards Board (ASB) has said a print ad promoting the Sydney Mardi Gras was exploitative, degrading and highly sexualised.
The Avant Card postcard promoted #theresonlyoneparty and featured an image by artist Elvis Di-Fazio which depicted an oiled and naked man sitting on the back of a female dressed in black underwear and fishnet stockings with the pair perched on a kitchen bench.
A long complaint to the ASB said the ad promoted “the sexual domination of females that reflects the message that this is acceptable and normal behaviour”.
“My concern is that this postcard is freely available to people of any age including children in cafes, retail outlets, theatres etc and that it sends a message that Australian society tolerates – indeed promotes – sexual domination of women and that the ideal female is one who is willing to go down on all fours to enable a man to ride her.
“I am not complaining about a female’s choice of sexual practices and do not suggest that this act in itself necessarily disempowering to females, it is the context – a postcard image with freely available without any context.”
The complainant stressed they had no problem with the Avant Card Company “who provide a fantastic and creative service promoting arts, not-for-profit and other organisations”, but added: “My complaint is that in this instance this freely available card sends the wrong message to society and to young females and males in particular who are highly influenced by the media.”
The Sydney Mardi Gras defended the ad, saying it “was in no way intended to demean or degrade women, or to suggest any sexual subordination or domination”.
In its submission to the ASB, the Sydney Mardi Gras apologised for the delay in responding to the complaint which had been issued on January 24, citing a redistribution of roles in the organisation.
They continued on to explain the ad, saying the woman featured is renowned burlesque artist Lillian Starr “whose work challenges traditional notions of gender and sexuality through performance”.
It added: “Lillian was a key contributor in devising the image in which she appeared.
“The three images used in this postcard campaign were selected for their visual impact and were intended to be attention-catching. I accept that in isolation the image in question may have been confronting for some people and the image could be misinterpreted without the appropriate context.
“As a community driven organisation which exists to promote equal rights and challenges discrimination of the basis of gender or sexuality, we are always perceptive to the views of the community and encourage people to share their views on how we operate. While we remain confident that our intent behind using this image was sound, receiving this thorough and well thought out complaint has led to much discussion and will certainly inform our decision-making in the future.”
In its ruling, the board noted “that on its own, the image has no clear connection to the Mardi Gras and that the depiction of someone on all fours in this manner is an image consistently considered by the community as a sexualised image suggestive of one person dominating another”.
It ruled that the image “did employ sexual appeal in a manner which is exploitative and degrading”.
The board also ruled that the ad did not treat the issue of sex, sexuality and nudity with sensitivity as the image was sexualised and could easily be viewed by children, thus the complaint was upheld.
Mardi Gras Sydney acknowledged the ruling and advised “the card is no longer being distributed and this image will not be used again in the future in inappropriate venues”.
Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.
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We’ve come a long way since Andrew Denton in 1993 featured an interview with a fully naked Forum Man Of the Year. Not. As Joe Jackson sang in Real Men (1981) – “We think it’s getting better but nobody’s really sure”.
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RE: Latest ad for Coopers Mid. If you can handle a bit of constructive critic, your recent ad does absolutely nothing for your good quality beer, very poor. I could easily put something much better together than what you already have. The ad at present doesn’t come across, You have a good product which I enjoy, there is a way to tell it. Regards Dave Bauer.
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Mumbrella team: there isn’t an “s” on Mardi – and it’s “Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras” – not Sydney Mardi Gras. 🙂
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@Rob.. you are right with the “s” but the Gay and Lesbian has now been dropped from the name.
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so faux pas
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Any suggestion (evidence, even) of where the complaint came from?
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