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Battle of the billboards

By Wendy Francis - posted Monday, 10 May 2010


On the fence-line of one of Brisbane’s most prestigious boy’s schools there is a billboard advertising for “Two Naughty Bars” featuring highly sexual imagery of women.

Monday to Friday to and from school, students of Brisbane Boys Grammar School are forced to digest these images as they can’t just "switch it off".

Is it a coincidence that this advertising is found outside a boy’s school? Or is this “clever” marketing? An Advertising Standards Bureau (ASB) spokeswoman recently stated that a billboard’s ‘‘audience’’ depended on the location and placement of the billboard.

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Recently we saw the demise of the Liberal Treasurer in WA after it was discovered that he was having an affair with a Greens Senator. Our society does not condone this bad behaviour. We value honesty, faithfulness and integrity. It’s part of being Aussie. And yet, in contravention of prevailing community standards, in Brisbane alone, we have such billboards promoting a “gentleman’s clubs” with slogans such as “Tell your wife you’ll be home late”.

This particular billboard was the third most complained about billboard in Australia last year. The complaints were dismissed by the ASB, the billboard remained and two other identical billboards went up around the city.

So, next time a Dad phones home from work and says to his kids, “Tell mum I’ll be home late tonight”, are they left wondering where he really is and who he is spending his evening with rather than being home with them?

How can the ASB seriously claim to be representing prevailing community standards?

Industry observers say the bureau is sending mixed messages. Professor Sandra Jones, from the Centre for Health Initiatives at Wollongong University, says: ''On the one hand they are saying they want to give consumers a voice and show advertisers boundaries, yet on the other they continue to dismiss complaints.''

On Friday, April 23, I held a summit on outdoor advertising. Representatives from the National Civic Council, Australian Family Association, Collective Shout, LNP, Body Matters as well as authors on the topic and child psychologists were in attendance. The purpose of the summit was to plan a way ahead to change the current self-regulatory nature of the Advertising Standards Bureau which is clearly not working and not representative of prevailing community standards.

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The CEO of the Outdoor Media Association, Charmain Mudorich, also attended the summit and noted that the ethics codes with regard to billboard placement mentions that ads for alcohol aren’t allowed within a certain range from schools. So, does that mean billboards for sex bars are less destructive?

Our children inhabit our public spaces. But images and messages that would not be allowed on TV before late night viewing so as to protect the innocence of our children are then forced upon the general public in the outdoors.

The involuntary nature of exposure to these images undermines the authority of parents to determine the content their children view. Experts agree that the sexualisation of our culture is having a negative impact on our children, but the ASB do not consult child development professionals when deliberating on complaints that are about children being exposed to sexualised imagery or text.

Julie Gale from Kids Free 2B Kids said recently, “Research shows that exposure to sexualised imagery is linked to children's experience of increased anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, body image problems, eating disorders, self harm, and sexually transmitted infections. Kids are also becoming sexually active at younger and younger ages.”

Given the "relevant audience and relevant programme time zone" of outdoor advertising (general audience and all time zones), the Outside Media Association members are breaching the AANA code of ethics every time a sexually explicit billboard is displayed. Sexual imagery is undoubtedly in contravention of prevailing community standards for children's viewing.

The irony of this debate is that when I decided to put up a different sort of billboard - one with the slogan “OUTDOOR ADVERTISING SHOULD BE G-RATED”, the artwork was rejected by major billboard companies in Brisbane for no particular reason (apart from it potentially affecting their business).

While my ad did not breach any advertising standards, it did not fit the ideology of the media companies. I was being censored - not the other way around! After significant lobbying and support from community groups the billboard has finally gone up on Creek Road, Carina. The response has been immediate and the petition webpage promoted on the billboard crashed from the high volume of people logging on to sign it.

This petition will be presented to the Senate with a series of recommendations developed by me and a group of key representative organisations, teachers, psychologists and creative experts who met at the Summit last week.

I want to underline that billboards do not discriminate in terms of audience or time zones. Billboards are not vetted before they go in to public arena.

Even if an ad was deemed unsuitable, the damage has already been done and the desired marketing effect has been achieved. Many of the images in outdoor advertising would be deemed sexual harassment if they were in an office/work space.

The AANA Code for Advertising and Marketing Communications for Children which the ASB follows states:
  • Advertising or Marketing Communications to Children must not include sexual imagery in contravention of Prevailing Community Standards.
  • Advertising or Marketing Communications to Children must not undermine the authority, responsibility or judgment of parents or carers.
  • Advertising or Marketing Communications shall treat sex, sexuality and nudity with sensitivity to the relevant audience and, where appropriate, the relevant programme time zone.

These codes fully support outdoor advertising being G-rated. Given the "relevant audience and relevant programme time zone" of outdoor advertising (general audience and all time zones), I believe that the OMA members are breaching the AANA code of ethics every time a sexually explicit billboard is displayed. I also believe that the sexual imagery is undoubtedly in contravention of prevailing community standards for children's viewing and that it undermines the authority of parents to determine the content their children view.

The summit resulted in several key recommendations being tabled and developed a petition which has already gained considerable attention demonstrating how strongly people feel about this issue.

Again, this is not about censorship. As the renowned “free speech absolutist” Naomi Wolf said in The Sunday Age (May 2, 2010): “I think it’s appropriate to keep pornography away from children. I don’t think it’s censorship to keep public space porn-free - people still have a choice about when they want to consume it. I don’t feel it’s right to impose pornography on - people in the public sphere.”

Those lending their support to my campaign, those represented by supportive community groups and I are not just complaining about the negative influence that sex-based advertisements are having on our kids. We want to be part of the solution to enable a culture that is family-friendly with ethical, representative screening to avoid moments such as your six-year-old asking "What is Sexpo?" or "Why do you have to be sexy to drink Sprite?"

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About the Author

Wendy Francis is the director of the Australian Christian Lobby’s Centre for Human Dignity. Prior to this Wendy has served in managerial positions at the Centre for Public Culture and Ideas at Griffith University and also Queensland Baptists. Wendy also ran for a senate position with Family First in 2010. She commenced a campaign in 2009 calling for outdoor advertising to be G rated.

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Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

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