‘Highly sexualised’ Missguided fashion ad that aired on ITV in partnership with Love Island is banned for showing women as ‘sexual objects’ – despite the chain arguing it was ’empowering’
- The ad from the fashion chain aired on ITV as part of a Love Island partnership
- Missguided claimed that the ad was empowering and showed confident women
- However, it led to an Advertising Standards complaint for being over sexualised
- The ASA have now ruled that the ad objectified women and could be offensive
A TV advert of young women spinning around in barely-there bikinis, spreading their legs and running their hands over their near naked bodies has been banned.
Advertising watchdogs have blocked a video-on-demand ad for the Missguided fashion chain, which appeared on an ITV channel as part of a partnership with the Love Island TV series for treating young women as mere sex objects and decoration.
Just as the programme itself focuses on young women with beauty pageant physiques who spend most of their time in the sun wearing very little, so the commercial used similar images and themes.
However, the commercial drew a complaint that it was overly sexualised and objectified women with the result it was both offensive and irresponsible.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has today upheld the complaint at a time the industry watchdog is clamping down on the sexualisation of young women and gender stereotypes amid concerns over their impact on youngsters.
The ad, which was shown in June, opened with close-up of a woman’s mouth as she held a strawberry between her lips and played up the idea that its summer fashions left very little to the imagination.
It then showed young women in a series of seductive poses, starting with swimwear on a boat accompanied by on-screen text which stated: ‘If you plan on wearing clothes this summer… we’ve got you covered… kind of’.
An advert from fashion chain Missguided has been banned by an advertising watchdog for being over-sexualised
The Advertising Standards Authority concluded that the ad ‘was irresponsible and likely to cause serious offence’
The commercial went on to show young women on a beach with their legs apart, one running her hand up her inner thigh, a group posing in thong bikinis and another in a string bikini with her legs astride a motorbike.
In its defence, Missguided said the commercial was shot to ‘show empowering, confident young women’.
The online fashion business claimed the display of skin was ‘relevant, necessary and unavoidable’ given that the ad was promoting the summer wear collection, which included bikinis.
It argued it was not particularly different to images one might see on a beach during summer or that were used in any advert for a bikini.
And it argued that the imagery that some people might construe as sexual, including the woman with a strawberry between lips, were merely motifs used to create the lifestyle brand.
Missguided said the shot of the models in thong bikinis was designed to show the bikini from behind, while it argued the themes and images were ‘tasteful’ and in keeping with the way the target audience of Love Island behaves.
In its defence, Missguided said the commercial was shot to ‘show empowering, confident young women’ – however, the ASA said that while much of the footage was acceptable for a TV commercial promoting swimwear, other parts were highly sexualised
Missguided said the shot of the models in thong bikinis was designed to show the bikini from behind, while it argued the themes and images were ‘tasteful’ – but the ASA said ‘in many of the scenes the women looked seductively at the camera with their lips parted and their poses were sexually suggestive – in particular in the scene of the model sprawled out over the bike which presented her as merely a decoration to the bike’
In banning the ad, the watchdog said it has told Missguided not to use advertising that objectified women and which was likely to cause serious offence
However, the ASA said that while much of the footage was acceptable for a TV commercial promoting swimwear, ‘others went further and were highly sexualised’.
It added: ‘The scene of the four women in thong bikinis leaning against a wall exposed a lot of the buttocks and hips of three of the women. The very next scene showed another woman in a similar thong bikini sitting astride a motorbike and leaning back with one arm bent above her head.
‘While we acknowledged that the heads and faces of the women were often shown, in many of the scenes the women looked seductively at the camera with their lips parted and their poses were sexually suggestive – in particular in the scene of the model sprawled out over the bike which presented her as merely a decoration to the bike.
‘We did not therefore agree that the women in those scenes were presented as empowered, confident young women. We considered that the cumulative effect of the scenes meant that overall, the products had been presented in an overly-sexualised way that invited viewers to view the women as sexual objects.’
The ASA statement said: ‘We considered that the cumulative effect of the scenes meant that overall, the products had been presented in an overly-sexualised way that invited viewers to view the women as sexual objects’
The ASA said that while the images were similar to those seen as part of the Love Island series, ‘we considered that some viewers who enjoyed the programme would nevertheless be seriously offended by advertising that presented women as sexual objects. Because the ad objectified women, we concluded that it was irresponsible and likely to cause serious offence.’
In banning the ad, the watchdog said it has told Missguided not to use advertising that objectified women and which was likely to cause serious offence.
In a second ruling, the ASA also banned a marketing email from another online fashion firm, Boohoo, which featured the subject heading ‘Send Nudes’.
It was designed to promote a collection of natural, skin tone, fashions, however the ASA said it was likely to be understood as referring to requests for sexual photos, which could be a form of sexual harassment.
Source: Read Full Article