Trigger warning: Sexual assault/rape
Two advertisements of a perfume company in India glorifying rape culture were taken down by the Indian ad regulatory body, the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI).
“The ad is in serious breach of the ASCI Code and is against public interest. We have taken immediate action and notified the advertiser to suspend the ad, pending investigation,” the body said while replying to a complaint regarding the ads.
Two different ads from the same company caused an outrage in India for insensitively portraying rape.
In one of the ads, four men can be seen entering a store. They are shown having a dispute over who will take a ‘shot’. There are four of them, but only one ‘shot’ is available. During this debate, instead of the bottle of body spray, a woman is shown and it looks like they are having an argument over who will first rape the woman. The woman even turns around in anger, believing the four men are talking about her. However, she is then shown relieved, when one of the men picks up the body spray called ‘Shot’.
People on social media expressed their anger over the adverstiments:
