15 Advertisements That Were (Rightfully) Banned

Sometimes, advertising crosses a line into “not fit for human consumption” territory.
15 Advertisements That Were (Rightfully) Banned

You are the most powerful and important being on the planet Earth. You enjoy this list of interesting facts. You enjoy the way you think about things in terms of “interesting facts.” It's a big universe out there. You are part of it. This universe is one of trillions of other universes, but you are the only one in all of them who can appreciate the fact that your brain has just been engaged by an amusing and entertaining list of facts, which is itself an interesting fact. It's all so complicated, yet so simple. There's a kind of simplicity to it all, don't you think? The universe is composed of nothing but little bits of stuff and energy. Energy and stuff are constantly changing from one form to another. Your brain is made up of little bits of stuff and energy, constantly changing from one form to another. And your brain, this universe inside your skull, is more complex than the whole universe. That's what makes it interesting to enjoy this list of interesting facts about you and the universe.

Nottingham’s “Anti-Begging” Ads

Nottingham's Anti-Begging Ads CRACKED.COM City councils and police are some other groups that are typically pretty careful with their messaging, but in 2016, a joint effort by the city of Nottingham put up posters all over town depicting homeless people misusing panhandling money, claiming that such money just goes to a fraud or up in smoke. The posters were obviously immediately defaced by the public, who made it clear they'd rath- er fund some guy's weed than these ads, and the ASA banned them for just being, like, really jerky.

Buzzfeed

An Online Gambling Site’s “Pay For Your Wife’s Cancer Treatment” Ad

An Online Gambling Site's Pay For Your Wife's Cancer Treatment Ad 888 2 YEARS of excellence casino 15 £88 £50 £20 CRACKED COM Gambling websites are usually really careful to claim that bankrupting your- self with their services is for entertain- ment only, so it was pretty bold for the website 888 to run an advertisement depicting a depressed man who had sold his house to pay for his wife's can- cer treatment discovering the site while waiting outside the hospital and won over 30 times his annual salary in a single spin. Bold enough to get banned by the

Buzzfeed

Anti-Government “Boogaloo” Ads

Anti-Government Boogaloo Ads GRACKED.COM 2020 was not a year marked by its po- litical unity, but just to rile people up further, a group of anti-government or- ganizations known as Boogaloos (why are they always so embarrassingly named?) started creating ads for social media imploring people to join the mi- litia, fight the state through violent clips from action movies. Facebook re- sponded with a resounding whoopsie and pulled the ads.

Buzzfeed

Klarna’s “Lift My Mood” Into Debt Ads

Klarna's Lift My Mood Into Debt Ads صا App. CRACKED.COM At the height of restrictions on public gathering during the COVID-19 pan- demic, the buy now, pay later service Klarna paid a bunch of influencers to post that using the service lifted their moods during the lockdown, only to be struck down by the ASA for the im- plication that pandemic-induced de- pression and anxiety can be relieved by going into debt. Basically, they said the quiet part out loud.

Sky

Yves St. Laurent’s Skeletal Model

Yves St. Laurent's Skeletal Model CRACKED.COM Also in 2015, the ASA banned a print ad for Yves St. Laurent that featured a model who was al- ready extremely thin but then also lit in such a way that made her appear on the verge of death. They can't even find an actual body thin enough for high fashion anymore.

BBC

XLS-Medical Max Strength Diet Pills

XLS-Medical Max Strength Diet Pills GRACKED.COM A 2015 ad for diet pills was banned by the ASA for taking an irresponsi- ble approach to body image and confidence by featuring an already unusually slim young woman com- plaining that she'll never fit into the clothes she bought for vacation, a problem seemingly more easily solved by exchanging them. Now do all diet pill ads.

Buzzfeed

Rachel Weisz Revitalift Ad

Rachel Weisz Revitalift Ad L'OREAL adidas REVITALIER CRACKED.COM The ASA also banned a 2012 ad for L'Oreal Revitalift anti-wrinkle cream featuring a suspiciously smooth-faced Rachel Weisz that read, Wrinkles appear reduced, skin looks smoother, complexion looks more even. It's not a facelift, it's Revitalift. It turned out it wasn't either - it was Pho- toshop.

BBC

Dacia’s Car Commercial

Dacia's Car Commercial That Offends Everyone CRACKED.COM Romanian car company Dacia made what AdWeek described as the most offensive car commercial ever in 2011, using dick jokes and ethnic stereotypes to offend the elderly, car salesmen, and the entire country of Romania. Warning: There are ra- cial slurs for the Romani people in that commercial. Like, whoa, really bad ones.

AdWeek

“Would You Rather Slap Rihanna or Punch Chris Brown?”

Would You Rather Slap Rihanna or Punch Chris Brown? GRACKED.COM In 2018, Snapchat pulled an ad for a game called Would You Rather?! that asked users whether they'd prefer to slap Rihanna or punch Chris Brown, which would be bad enough if some of those things hadn't actu- ally happened. The game itself ар- parently had questions about, among other things, raping llamas, so at least it was upfront about its tastelessness.

NYTimes

Dolce & Gabbana

Dolce and Gabbana's Gang Rape Ad OLCE & GABBAN CRACKED.COM In 2007, Dolce and Gabbana advertised their spring collection with a print ad of a woman presumably wearing a D&G dress, but it's kind of hard to tell under- neath the man holding her down while three other men look on with expres- sions that can only be described as patiently rapey. It was quickly banned from publication in Italy by the country's somewhat misleadingly named Advertising Self-Discipline Insti- tute, who released a statement amounting to, Come on. Like, serious- ly, come on.

News

Calvin Klein’s Pedophiley Brooke Shields Ad

Calvin Klein's Pedophiley Brooke Shields Ad CRACKED.COM Calvin Klein is known for their gross commercials, but they went too far for CBS and ABC in 1980, when the net- works banned a commercial featuring a panning shot over the body of a very 15-year-old-looking Brooke Shields, in- cluding directly into her crotch, before she peers coyly into the camera and whispers, You wanna know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing. Poor Shields didn't even real- ize what she was implying about her undergarment situation.

Today

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