Monday, December 04, 2006

The chicken or the egg??

A MANUFACTURER of prophylactics and an advertising agency inThailand have been fined after they ran an advertisement for durian-flavoured condoms.
The advertisement was guilty of "encouraging sexual misconduct in young people," the Consumer Protection Committee ruled.
The advertisement, which appeared in newspapers, has been banned.
Sure Text manufaturing Durian condoms has been fined 30,000 baht and the agency, Next & Triplet, 15,000 baht.
The two firms breached a law prohibiting advertisements which are "directly or indirectly detrimental to national culture," the committee judged.
Sure Text and Next & Triplet apparently admitted that their aim was, in the words of the committee, "to attract buyers with the prospect of sexual excitement through the new durian fragrance of the condom."
The committee said the advertisement contained no warning of the hazards of premature sexual relationships.
"Instead, it seeks to encourage and invite young people in their age of curiousness to engage in sexual relationships which are dangerous for society," the committee said.

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Obviously this is a media report which appeared sometime back in the net. While it may appear to be true that advertising
is all about adding to promiscuity and reckless behaviour, It is not always the case. At the risk of being branded as the Devils advocate , let me share with you what I think about the use , over use, abuse and misuse of sex in advertising. This is more relevant today ,that this small but over populous world has just observed "World AIDS day".....

"Encouraging sexual misconduct of young people" is a dumb founded allegation simply because the reason for it if one scans could be seen in the other factors of the world like increasing feeling of independence, larger disposible incomes and empty nest cultures, all the nuclear family kids having grown up starting to live on their own, the boom in the IT industry and its allied sectors like ITES and the resultant abundance of money and loss of the influence of religion over a large section of people. Advertising at the best may promote one to peep into as to see 'what is there inside', but then ,was not this 'cat like curiousity' part of human behaviour ever since Adam and Eve?

My fathers generation, it wasnt reported and things went on secretly, mine they started noticing it and the next generation they started recording it and producing statistics......

In any case if it was advertising which was making people behave the way they do- promiscous or otherwise- how much money is spent on such "encouraging of sexual misconduct" and how much is spend the world over by everyone, to "tell them the illeffects of irresponsible sexual behaviour"? which one is on the higher side?

My study says that world over all the 'condom guys' put together are not spending anything near compared to what the 'other guys'( AIDS prevention+UN +WHO + what not...) are spending for countering of such "encouraging of sexual misconduct"...and still if the young generation world over are 'up with their armaments' and indulges in thoughtless acts of fulfilling their hunger and thirst of the body, it simply, to me, means that either the condom guys are saying it amazingly well, or the other guys are simply spending money in communication that isnt working, or then it is what behaviour science text books calls as the"external attribution of error"......

And that is to assume that all the condom ads are in bad taste, any fool knows that it is not the case...it is easy to blame......blame the advertiser for all the ills of the society- be it sex, be it paranoid mothers or be it increasing craving for materialism....

The blame game will go on.....and we will never be told was it the chicken or the egg which came first......

Who is fooling whom?

There was a middle-aged couple that had two stunningly beautiful teen-aged daughters. They decided to try one last time for the son they always wanted.
After months of trying, the wife became pregnant and sure enough, nine months later delivered a healthy baby boy.
The joyful father rushed to the nursery to see his new son. He took one look and was horrified to see the ugliest child he had ever seen.
He went to his wife and said that there was no way that he could be the father of that child.

"Look at the two beautiful daughters I fathered."

Then he gave her a stern look and asked, "Have you been fooling around on me?"

The wife smiled sweetly and said, "Not this time"......

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