DECISION

ADVERTISING STANDARDS COMPLAINTS BOARD PO Box 10-675 Wellington Telephone (04) 472-7852 Facsimile (04) 471-1785 Email asa@asa.co.nz Website www.asa.co.nz 04/282 DECISION Meeting 14 September 2004 Complaint 04/282 Complainant: D Cook Advertiser: Amnesty International Complaint: An advertisement for Amnesty International was published in the Sunday Star Times on 9 May 2004. It was part of a campaign to “Stop Violence Against Women” and portrayed five “mother’s day gifts from around the world!”. The illustrations included a handgun, several cushions, a knife, crutches and a shovel and the following sales points and captions were used to describe the items. “HOT BUY - LUXURY -2 FOR 1 - LIMITED TIME and END OF THE LINE”. All items had associated text, for example, the hand gun read,” In 1999, in Pakistan alone, more than 1000 women were victims of “Crimes of Honour”. It also stated, “Whether it’s the head, the torso, or the back of the neck, nothing works faster than a bullet. It’s the classic gift that no Mum can refuse! She’ll be blown away!” The advertisement concluded with the following explanation, “You may have found some of these gifts made you a little uncomfortable, or even outraged. Every day, women all over the world receive gifts like these. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Violence against women is generally under-reported because of shame, fear, disbelief or hostility…”. The Complainant said: “Firstly my apologies for the long delay from publication of the original Amnesty International Advertisement until my lodging of this complaint. I originally phoned Amnesty International when i first heard the ad on Mother’s Day on the radio and then over the next four weeks had several conversations with them regarding this irresponsible and highly damaging advertising campaign in an attempt to get them to withdraw, eventually ending up speaking to John Shaw, who is I believe the chief executive. My efforts were fruitless, but very revealing and at that time I had to leave NZ to travel to the UK on business and then back to my regular job at Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. Not having lodged a complaint before, I had intended to lodge a complaint on my return to NZ and then realised there might be a time limit. If that is so, then I hope you may still give consideration 2 04/282 to this complaint as it concerns a very serious matter of inaccurate perceptions and discrimination concerning perceived violence by men. The grounds for my complaint are the following: The advertisements are highly discriminatory against men. I do not believe anyone would dare make equivalent publicly anti-women statements nor such a statement if it were aimed at an ethnic, religious, or other social group. There is a public perception that the vast majority of violence within relationships is from men against women and that from women against men is negligible or non-existent. This is not so. The publicly available figures are 21% of women report violence and one in eight men, or 12 1/2%. it is thought that the one of reasons the figure for men is lower is that it is considered un-manly and embarrassing for a man to admit being beaten by his female partner, while women are encouraged to go public. However, whatever the reasons, it is accepted that violence within a relationship against men is under-reported to a considerable extent That the advertisement has been placed by Amnesty International without factual background knowledge and has in fact been based on hearsay and prejudice without understanding of the consequences they may be unleashing. For instance, it is very difficult for a man to get protection for either himself or his children when the mother is violent. On a day when most men in relationships are making a big effort to give special attention to the mother, as are the children if old enough, that this type of advertising is highly divisive, both between the partners and also potentially alienating children, by placing the blame on fathers. If the relationship is already floundering this type of inflammatory advertising is not helpful and seeks to apportion blame without foundation. Certainly if this type of accusation were made against an individual without factual cause it would be grounds for charges of libel or slander. John Shaw has told me that this is the start of a TWO YEAR CAMPAIGN against violence to women. If this is the start and this type of exaggeration is permitted to continue I hate to think where we may be in two years. I submit that this advertisement is not in fact pro women, but anti men, because of the terms in which it is stated. While I appreciate the chairman’s statement that advocacy advertising should allow robust opinions, I would ask the chairman to consider whether this should be so when an organisation so powerful in forming public opinion as Amnesty International should be allowed to do so against one sector of the community without factual knowledge to back up their case as I will show. My first call protesting this advertising campaign was to a member of the Amnesty staff at about 9 AM on Mother’s Day. The lady in question instantly responded by asking me if 1 knew that 21% of women were in violent relationships. I said i did and did she know that the public figure available for men in the same situation was one in eight? She never responded and so I also stated that the figures were thought to be that low because of the previously mentioned under reporting. She again did not say she knew of that and I got the impression she was very surprised and had not known. She defended the decision and offered to send me papers to make application to join! and said she would get back to me. She never did. Later that week I rang again to the 3 04/282 same lady and she said she had been busy and not able to get back , but appeared still to be clinging defensively to her point of view. Eventually when I rang again I was put through to J Shaw who was equally defensive. He mentioned female circumcision. A complete misnomer as it happens, because it is nothing like male circumcision, i.e. relatively minor. It is nothing short of genital mutilation in women and I told him that and said I didn’t like it being minimised. I felt it should be called just what it is. He then went on to mention honour killings, which I also know about and I mentioned bride burning, (Remember I work in the Middle East in a community that has many ethnic groups from the areas where these things ARE practised) At no time did John mention violence in NZ. As far as I am aware, there have been no reported instances of those three categories of violence in NZ, so his attempt to justify his actions were totally irrelevant. [Mr Shaw] also made the statement that that it was his perception, note perception, he offered no facts, that women were more afraid of violence in the street than men. I refuted that. While I felt that men and women were equally afraid of violence I felt the type of violence they were afraid of was different. In fact while my older girl was out with some of her University friends one evening in a group of two boys and two girls, they were surrounded by five young men and the boys were attacked without provocation. Neither of the girls were physically assaulted, but the boys were in big trouble until my daughter retaliated with a clenched fist punch on the ring leader who was hurt and amazed. They backed off saying “we don’t hit girls? and then fled. Fortunately my daughter is physically strong and hurt him enough to cause the retreat. What would John have to say of all that? I am a victim of violence from my former wife which I did not report and after we parted this violence continued on against first my eldest daughter (who also did not report it) and then later after she moved out of the house against my younger girl. My ex-wife was able to smokescreen and avoid responsibility for a very long time by claiming that the violence was initiated by me and only when she publicly assaulted the younger girl and there were witnesses to the event was I able to get proper attention to the problem from the Authorities. I was told by one official that if I had treated my younger girl in the way her mother did that as a man I would have gone straight to jail. Apart from the family court ordering anger management counselling for the mother she has received no sanctions what so ever. I am not alone in this. I can actually produce for you several other men or children who I know of that are also victims of female violence. This is without any research at all, they are simply known to me in the community. This type of advertising only adds to the problem that men have in over coming a public perception that men and not women are violent and protecting both themselves and their children, when in fact violence is a problem within the community from both male and female. There are enough high profile cases around where women are the perpetrators for 4 04/282 someone in a position as responsible and as influential as J Shaw occupies to be better informed than he is. In a day where we are striving to achieve safety and equality for all members of the community he is required to demonstrate a very high standard of public awareness and accuracy in his statements and actions. He claimed that before the advertising campaign was started Amnesty International had thought a great deal about the content. There is no evidence of this, either in the advertising itself, or in his or his staff members attempted defense of it. I have also spoken today, the 27th of July to C Smith, from Amnesty International. He also clings to justification of their advertising campaign and likewise states that it is his perception that women in society are more afraid of violence than men. Again without evidence. He claims this is not just about domestic violence, but the fact that it was published on Mother’s Day and also they produced greetings cards entitled “Happy Mother’s Day Bitch” would in my view contradict that statement. This is a rather lengthy statement, but the issues are so important that I feel unable to reduce it significantly. Thank you for your consideration and I look forward to your response.” The Complainant also said: “I have spoken today to C Smith of Amnesty International, who takes the same line as J Shaw. He likewise has very little to support his statements and claims this is not about domestic violence in NZ. While the advert does in some places mention specific areas of violence outside NZ, the fact that it was placed on Mother’s Day would in my opinion refute that assertion. I feel the advert is highly damaging to men and discriminates against them. It is at best unlikely to assist any relationship. It is PEOPLE who are violent. Not just men…”. The Chairman ruled that the following provisions were relevant: Code of Ethics Basic Principle 4: All advertisements should be prepared with a due sense of social responsibility to consumers and to society. Rule 2 Truthful Presentation - Advertisements should not contain any statement or visual presentation or create an overall impression which directly or by implication, omission, ambiguity or exaggerated claim is misleading or deceptive, is likely to deceive or mislead the consumer, makes false and misleading representation, abuses the trust of the consumer or exploits his/her lack of experience or knowledge. (Obvious hyperbole, identifiable as such, is not considered to be misleading). Rule 11 5 04/282 Advocacy Advertising - Expression of opinion in advocacy advertising is an essential and desirable part of the functioning of a democratic society. Therefore such opinions may be robust. However, opinion should be clearly distinguishable from factual information. The identity of an advertiser in matters of public interest or political issue should be clear. Code for People in Advertising Basic Principle 3 Advertisements should not portray people in a manner which, taking into account generally prevailing community standards, is reasonably likely to cause serious or widespread offence on the grounds of their gender; race; colour; ethnic or national origin; age; cultural, religious, political or ethical belief; sexual orientation; marital status; family status; education; disability; occupational or employment status. The Advertiser said: “Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments on the complaint made by D Cook concerning the Generator advertisements produced for Amnesty International NZ in May 2004 for the Stop Violence Against Women campaign. First some general comments and then some response to the relevant sections in the Advertising Codes of Practice. The campaign, launched internationally by Amnesty International (AI) in March 2004, aims to put violence against women squarely in the spotlight as one of the most serious patterns of human rights abuse. In common with all AI campaigns we are seeking to generate awareness, action and change by reaching members of the public, politicians and the media. The media campaign was launched on Mother’s Day to take advantage of the focus on women which that day provides. Why a campaign focusing solely on violence against women and girls? The campaign does not assert that violence against women is the only form of violence which occurs in society or in the family, and in no way disregards or minimises the significance of violence suffered by men at the hands of women or other men. For decades AI’s work focused primarily on violence and other abuses inflicted by state agents in the form of torture, extrajudicial killings and “disappearances. The focus on certain forms of political repression meant that the majority of victims on whose behalf AI worked tended to be men. Historically violence against women, particularly violence against women in the home, has been hidden, ignored and left off the human rights agenda, despite its massive scale. We need to highlight violence against women in order to redress this earlier lack of attention to the issue. The systematic discrimination of women has formed grave inequalities in the landscapes of our local and global communities. 6 04/282 Statistical and research basis for the claims made in the advertisements All AI’s claims are carefully researched - the basis of our credibility and support base amongst the general population, academia and political world over the 40 years we have been operating. Attached is an appendix detailing the sources for all the statistics used in the print ads (all were and are available, with sources, on our website: www.amnesty.org.nz) The radio ad was also based on real testimony. Relevant sections of the Advertising Codes of Practice Code of Ethics - Basic Principle 4 (All advertisements should be prepared with a due sense of social responsibility to consumers and to society.) AI’s sense of social responsibility is a core principle of the organisation and we could not afford to ignore such responsibility. The advertisements were approved by the Executive Director. Code of Ethics - Rule 2 (Truthful Presentation - Advertisements should not contain any statement or visual presentation or create an overall impression which directly or by implication, omission, ambiguity or exaggerated claim is misleading or deceptive, is likely to deceive or mislead the consumer, makes false and misleading representation, abuses the trust of the consumer or exploits his/her lack of experience or knowledge. (Obvious hyperbole, identifiable as such, is not considered to be misleading).) See comments above related to factual basis and research behind the advertisements. It seeks to help New Zealanders identify with a global problem by citing, in the main, statistics illustrating international patterns of abuse using irony to point out how such abuse is an everyday reality for millions of women despite the reverence given to mothers in ideal culture. Code of Ethics - Rule 11 (Advocacy Advertising - Expression of opinion in advocacy advertising is an essential and desirable part of the functioning of a democratic society. Therefore such opinions may be robust. However, opinion should be clearly distinguishable from factual information. The identity of an advertiser in matters of public interest or political issue should be clear.) The advertisements are based purely on fact rather than opinion. There are no claims that violence against women is the only form of violence or that it is the worst form in New Zealand. 7 04/282 Code for People in Advertising - Basic Principle 3 (Advertisements should not portray people in a manner which, taking into account generally prevailing community standards, is reasonably likely to cause serious or widespread offence on the grounds of their gender; race; colour; ethnic or national origin; age; cultural, religious, political or ethical belief; sexual orientation; marital status; family status; education; disability; occupational or employment status.) The print ad is focused on female victims of domestic and societal violence and does not refer at all to the perpetrators of violence except in one statistic (“70% of murdered women are killed by their male partners.”), therefore it could not be claimed to be discriminatory against men. The radio ad is a true story representative of a trend, and the reference to soldiers could not be said to be discriminatory against all men in general…”. Fairfax Sunday Newspapers said on behalf of the Media: “Thank you for your letter asking for comments on the above complaint. Please accept my apologies for the delay in this response. This advertisement was accepted from Amnesty International in good faith, nevertheless the Sunday Star Times would need to seriously consider if we run an advertisement of this nature in the future. To my knowledge we did not receive any reader complaints about this advertisement, however the nature of the presentation of this ad is perhaps a little “over the top”. In the future should we receive another advertisement of this nature we may consider getting advice from the NPA. I hope this information is helpful. We await the decision of the Board.” Deliberation The Complaints Board read the correspondence and examined a copy of the advertisement. It observed that in the Complainant’s view, the advertisement was highly discriminatory against men. The Chairman directed the Board to consider the complaint in terms of Basic Principle 4, Rule 2 and Rule 11 of the Code of Ethics and Basic Principle 3 of the Code for People in Advertising. The Complaints Board noted the nature of the advertisement and concluded that the provisions in Rule 11 were particularly relevant to its determination. It also noted that 8 04/282 advertisements advocating socially responsible messages were entitled to do so in a robust manner. The Board took into account the aim of the advertisement, which was to highlight and stop the violence against women. It acknowledged that this was a significant social issue and that the message extremely important. In addition, it was satisfied that the advertisement did not assert or imply that violence against women was the only form of violence occurring in society. The Board observed the statistics used by the Advertiser to justify the statements and concluded that there was nothing in the advertisement that was likely to mislead or deceive the public. In the Board’s view, the fact that the advertisement did not refer to, or highlight, violence suffered by men at the hands of women was not material to its determination. After all, it was equally open to the Complainant to highlight the position he advocated in relation to violence against others. The Board concluded that the advertisement complied with the requirements of the Code of Ethics and similarly was not discriminatory. Accordingly, it concluded that the advertisement did not breach Basic Principle 4, Rule 2 or Rule 11 of the Code of Ethics or Basic Principle 3 of the Code for People in Advertising. In the Board's opinion, the advertisement conveyed an important social message that was presented in an appropriate and unique manner. Accordingly the Board ruled to not uphold the complaint. Decision: Complaint Not Upheld