GUNS AND ADVERTISING
Listed below are some recent examples in which
advertisers have attempted to use guns to promote various goods. If you see an advertisement which offends you because,
for example, it glamorises or normalises guns and gun culture, or makes it
appear that guns are fun or cool you can contact:
Advertising
Standards Authority
Mid City Place
71 High Holborn
London WC1V 6QT
tel:
0207 492
2222
e-mail: www.asa.org.uk
OR
Ofcom Contact Centre
Riverside House
2a Southwark Bridge Road
London
SE1 9HA
tel: 020 7981 3040 or 0845 456 3000
email:
contact@ofcom.org.uk
OR
The Company whose product the
advert promotes
OR
Gun Control Network
February 2008
POSTERS ADVERTISING VIDEO
GAMES AND DVDs featuring a man toting a gun have been removed following
pressure from Gleen Reid, whose son was shot dead in Handsworth seven years
ago. The posters from Game Stop, a shop in Birmingham included the
words "Hand 'Em Over - Now! We Will Give You Cash For Your Games".
Gleen, who found the Families for Peace group, branded it a "slap in the
face for families who've lost someone through gun crime." The store's
commercial director has apologised.
Birmingham Mail,
10 March 2008
February 2008
THE HEADTEACHER of
a school in Gollanfield in the Highlands of Scotland was shocked to learn
that the school's website had advertised a course on how to repair guns and
maintain weapons. The ad was part of a package from Google. It
was branded "inappropriate and insensitive" for a school in view of shooting
tragedies at educational establishments in the USA and UK. The school
has now pulled all advertising off its website. The advertising was
criticised by Highlands and Islands Conservative MSP Mary Scanlon.
Highland News, 16
February 2008
November 2007
THE ADVERTISING STANDARDS AUTHORITY received 55 complaints
about three posters promoting the film Shoot 'Em Up. The ASA cleared one of
the posters but ruled that the other two posters should not be shown again.
It said it was "mindful of growing levels of public concern" over gun use
and that the two ads could be seen to condone violence by glorifying or
glamorising the use of guns.
Guardian,
21 November 2007
September 2007
A COMEDY CLUB advert which
featured a child wearing a cowboy hat, pointing a toy gun at his own head,
has been banned by Lothian Buses. The bus company decided it
was inappropriate for a brochure it gives out to passengers on its
sightseeing tour buses.
Evening News (Edinburgh),
22 September 2007
September 2007
POSTERS promoting Shoot 'Em
Up, a violent gun film, were put up in bus stop billboards across
Manchester including a location outside the park where teenager Jessie James
was shot dead in September 2006. The posters showed an actor pointing an
automatic pistol. After being contacted by the Manchester Evening
News they were removed by the bus stop company JC Devaux.
Manchester Evening News,
8 September 2007
April 2007
AN ADVERTISING company sparked
outrage by sending out plastic guns to Yorkshire businesses as part of a
"crass and highly inappropriate" campaign to promote a new office block in
Barnsley. The toy guns were sent by Leeds-based C2 Advertising
and were received by property and media professionals just days after the
Virginia Tech shootings. The plastic pistol fires plastic pellets and
is packaged along with items for target practice. The toy 'revolver'
was used as a play on the word 'evolve', the name of the scheme being
promoted.
The stunt has been condemned by
MPs, senior police officers and victims' representatives. Assistant
Chief Constable Jawaid Akhtar commented that "it is worth reminding people
of the problems we face when toy or replica guns are taken outside and are
seen by other members of the public. ....we're talking about replicas
which could easily be mistaken for a real firearm". A spokeswoman for
C2 Advertising was unrepentant and said that the guns had been purchased
from a children's toy shop. That, of course, should not be an excuse
for such an irresponsible stunt and in fact raises further concerns about
how easy it remains for young people to get hold of realistic-looking guns
despite the passage of the Violent Crime Reduction Act which should have led
to the banning of the sale of imitation guns.
Yorkshire Post, 21 April
2007
January 2007
THE following press release from
Mothers against Murder and Aggression (MAMAA) highlights another
success in which, following complaints, the ASA has ruled against an
offensive advertisement which attempted to use violent images to promote a
product.
"MAMAA are delighted that the
complaints to the ASA about the irresponsible advertising by Dolce and
Gabbana have been upheld. We feel this is a victory not only for
MAMAA but for the other support groups and more importantly for the
families of those affected by gun and knife crime.
The ads which were featured in
the Times and the Daily Telegraph magazine supplement
featured men dressed in D&G clothing. Two of the men were holding knives
in an aggressive manner towards a third man sitting in a chair. A fourth
man was on the floor with a bullet wound to his head. One of the other
ads showed a man with a knife wound to his neck surrounded by women
brandishing knives.
MAMAA handed out copies of
these images at meetings with the police and the Home Office and to all
the organisations we work with resulting in more complaints to the ASA.
We felt that the adverts were
condoning and glamorising violence, offensive to families of murder
victims and were inappropriate and irresponsible. MAMAA are working with
other community groups, the police and the home office to reduce the
levels of crime and companies like D&G are undermining that work.
These companies, like a lot of
celebrities, have a platform to do so much good and they always do
something negative. The ASA said their response was that the ads were
designed to reflect Mediterranean culture and evoke the Napoleonic period,
taking its inspiration from well known paintings. They argued that they
were highly stylised and intended to be an iconic representation of that
period of art. They said that the men were not brandishing the knives in
an aggressive manner, and did not represent a realistic scene that could
cause offence, there were no words or expressions used to suggest violence
or any offensive act and showed the models in rigid poses in order to
concentrate the reader's attention on the clothes therefore the ad could
not cause offence.
The ad did not need words and
it did cause offence to many people, a picture supposedly paints a
thousand words, a few words of apology from D&G to the families of murder
victims would not go amiss. Tragically the use of knives and guns on all
our streets is now out of hand and weekly the number of families bereaved
in this terrible way is growing.
We applaud the ASA for
upholding the complaint and for making it known that even a company as big
as D&G can be taken to task. We wait in hope that the complaints against
the Bonnie and Clyde Puma trainers depicting guns is also upheld.
We would like to thank
everyone who complained for their support and have to admit that it feels
good to have taken on a big company and won!"
November 2006
FOOTWEAR giants Puma are the latest
company to have decided that it is appropriate to use guns to help sell
their products. New designer trainers depict a gun as the main emblem.
Community activists have chastised the company for insensitivity for the
Bonnie & Clyde Trainers which Puma describe as "merely a playful
interpretation of 1967 movie character Clyde Barrow's popular phrase 'I
steal for a living'. Among the criticisms has been one from Lee
Jasper, chair of Operation Trident Independent Advisory Group, who said that
Puma has been 'wildly irresponsible' in producing a gun emblem on the
trainers. Puma should remove the trainers from the market.
The Voice, 6 November 2006
August 2006
JEFFERY-WEST SHOES has had an advertising campaign
banned by the Advertising Standards Agency for irresponsibly
glamorising the use of guns. The firm ran an ad in a fashion magazine
depicting a woman dressed in a fun coat at the wheel of a car with a gun and
a pair of men's boots on the seat next to her. The ASA said the image
went beyond being surreal and implied a fashionable lifestyle and that the
gun was not related to the product and appeared solely as a glamorous
fashion accessory and promoted a lifestyle that condoned violence.
Guardian, 2 August 2006
January 2006
ADVERTISEMENTS for rapper 50 Cent's new movie Get Rich
Or Die Tryin' had already caused uproar in the US because of their gun
theme. There were complaints that they glorified gun violence,
following which the distributor, Paramount Pictures, said it was removing
them in Los Angeles (BBC, 28 October 2005).
Now the UK Advertising Standards Authority has
criticised a poster of 50 Cent holding a gun and a baby which was
being used to advertise the film soundtrack for Get Rich Or Die Tryin'.
The ad had sparked 17 complaints from people saying it was irresponsible
or offensive. The poster had appeared in an area recently associated
with gun crime involving children. The ASA said that "50 Cent's
association with gang culture and criminal behaviour was likely to be seen
as glamorising and condoning the possession and use of guns." It also
said that the combination of the title Get Rich Or Die Tryin' and the
rapper's image with a gun "could give the impression that success could be
achieved through violence".
BBC, 4 January 2006
September 2005
POLICE and residents were angered by the placing of a
poster for the film Revolver, which shows gun-toting criminals,
opposite the scene of a fatal shooting in Kensal Green. The local
authority, Brent Council, has been running a hard-hitting anti-guns campaign
to de-glamorise gun culture.
BBC, 7 September 2005
May 2005
THIS hoarding has been seen by GCN members at a number of
locations around the country. If you find it offensive and believe
that it sends out the wrong message about guns, especially in its reference
to "killing cops", get in the touch with the Advertising Standards Agency
(see details below).
The Advertising Standards Agency rejected
complaints about the ad, but welcomed the advertisers' assurance that future
posters of its kind would not be placed in areas of high gun crime.
Brand Republic, 20 July 2005
April 2005
MORE than 50 people complained to the Advertising
Standards Authority about a TV advert for the sportswear company Reebok.
In the advert, which featured American rapper 50 Cent, a shot was heard and
then he counted slowly up to nine - this was the number of times he was shot
in 2000 in New York. He then asked "Who you planning to massacre
next?" and laughed. Reebok have now withdrawn the advert.
Lucy Cope of Mothers Against Guns launched a
petition against the advert which was signed by 36 mothers whose children
have been shot dead and called for a boycott of Reebok's products. She
said that the advert glamourised gun crime. Reebok, who are still
showing the advert elsewhere worldwide, claimed that the advert was
"intended to be a positive empowering celebration of the right of
self-expression".
Daily Mirror, 18 April 2005.
February 2005
AN ADVERT for Ruddles Ale has been banned by the
ASA following 51 complaints. The promotion, which appeared in
newspapers, showed a shotgun positioned between two pub stools and pointed
in the direction of the reader. The wording alongside read: "Excuse
me, I believe that's my seat". The advert was considered to be
"offensive and irresponsible" because it "condoned the use of guns to
threaten people".
September 2004
TWO recent rulings have reflected a distaste for linking
guns to a "fun image" in advertisements.
The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld a
complaint about an advertisement which suggested that a replica gun gave
"hours of family fun without danger." The firm responsible,
Modern
Originals, was censured and ordered not to repeat the "irresponsible"
wording. The company claimed that the gun was a replica of one used in
the Normandy landings. In its ruling the ASA said that a replica gun
that fired 6mm pellets "could be dangerous if used irresponsibly".
In a widely-reported ruling Ofcom, the UK communications
watchdog, banned a TV advert for Land Rover which featured a woman firing a
gun. More than 300 complaints were received from viewers. The ad
was accused of glamorising or normalising gun culture. In it the woman
took a gun from a drawer and brandished it as she hurried after a man seen
leaving the house. As he climbed into a Land Rover vehicle she took
aim then shot skyward. The gun was a starting pistol: the man smiled
and drove away.
Ofcom ruled that the advert had breached guidelines on
harm and offence and must not be shown again.
"Given regular coverage of high-profile shooting
incidents and public concern about the wider social impact of the so-called
gun culture, the glamorisation and normalisation guns, even indirectly, is
simply offensive to many people".
Gun Control Network applauds both rulings which reinforce
that it is not appropriate to consider guns as fun objects.
