Sex is such an integral part of advertising at this point that you can’t even sell web-hosting without using a supermodel in a bikini. What does a supermodel in a bikini have to do with web-hosting? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. And it works like a charm.
So when marketers for London department store Harvey Nichols decided to promote their new beauty campaign, they figured they would sex up the idea of self-love by coming up with this:
[IMG SOURCE: jezebel.com]
See? That’s kinda neat. The fact that they gave the model forked eyebrows was kinda weird, but other than that it’s still kinda cool. But of course, hinting that a woman might make out with herself has vaguely lesbian overtones, which led to a number of complaints from people who have apparently never seen two people almost kiss before.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) received 17 complaints about the adverts: nine that the images were unsuitable to be seen by children because they appeared to show a lesbian kiss, 10 that they were sexually explicit and two that the phrase ‘love thyself’ in combination with the pictures was offensive on religious grounds.
On Wednesday, the ASA made the ruling that the ads didn’t show an almost-kiss between two lesbians, but instead a woman making out with herself, and so Harvey Nichols didn’t have to go to the gallows, or whatever. [SOURCE]
Regardless of whether this ad features two eerily identical lesbians about to make out or one woman about to mouth-fuck her own reflection à la Narcissus, who cares? It’s just a kiss. In fact, it’s not even a kiss; they’re two faces floating in each other’s presence. It’s not that big a deal.
That being said, the forked eyebrows. Forked. Eyebrows. That is freaking my shit the fuck out.
Why you can trust Xtra
