Home // September 5-9 2011 > UK phone ad with Jesus giving 'thumbs up' is banned

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UK phone ad with Jesus giving 'thumbs up' is banned

Published: September 07, 2011

'man talking on a mobile phone', on Flickr

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Britain's Advertising Standards Authority has banned an ad by a mobile phone company commercial which featured a cartoon Jesus who winked and gave a thumbs-up gesture, said an AFP report on 9News and a UKPA report.

The Phones 4 U campaign carried the slogan: "Miraculous deals on Samsung Galaxy Android phones".

"We considered that, although the ads were intended to be light-hearted and humorous, their depiction of Jesus winking and holding a thumbs-up sign, with the text "miraculous" deals during Easter, the Christian Holy Week which celebrated Christ's resurrection, gave the impression that they were mocking and belittling core Christian beliefs," the ASA said on Wednesday.

"We therefore concluded that the ads were disrespectful to the Christian faith and were likely to cause serious offence, particularly to Christians."

According to the UKPA report on Google News, the adverts were withdrawn and the company sent individual apologies to everyone who complained.

The Advertising Standards Authority said that the adverts must not be used again in their current form, the report added. 

FULL STORY

Jesus thumbs-up ad gets thumbs down (9News/AFP)

Jesus thumbs-up ad 'disrespectful' (Google News/UKPA)

PHOTO CREDIT

mattk1979 on Flickr

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic 

 

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Recent Comments

  1. Don't be fooled. This ban is nothing other than an example of political correctness designed illustrate to the wider public 'tolerance' of Christians, but in fact it serves to gag the Christian voice against speaking out on issues that affect the moral health of society, such as gay marriage and gay adoption etc.

    Posted By: Joanne

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