Benetton’s new advertising campaign is stirring excitement for all the wrong reasons on Tumblr.
Called “Unhate,” the campaign features altered images of world leaders of the same sex kissing, including Obama locking lips with Chinese President Hu Jintao and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez.
The White House has already come out against the images.
“The White House has a longstanding policy disapproving of the use of the president’s name and likeness for commercial purposes,” said White House Spokesman Eric Schultz, according to Reuters.
Those two aforementioned images are still prominently featured on the Italian retailer’s website, while another of Pope Benedict XVI kissing Sheikh Ahmed Mohamed el Tayeb of Egypt has been taken down due to complaints from the Catholic church.
“It shows a serious lack of respect for the pope,” Rev. Federico Lombardi told the Associated Press.
According to Benetton, the images are meant to emphasize tolerance and openness.
“At this moment in history, so full of major upheavals and equally large hopes, we have decided, through this campaign, to give widespread visibility to an ideal notion of tolerance and invite the citizens of every country to reflect on how hatred arises particularly from fear of ‘the other’ and of what is unfamiliar to us,” said Alessandro Benetton, executive deputy chairman of Benetton Group, in a statement.
On Tumblr, dozens of users reblogged the photos without adding any explanation, while others called them “offensive and disrespectful towards religious people,” to quote an anonymous Tumblr blogger on Shattering Inner Journeys.
“First of all, I just don’t think clothing companies should produce ads like this. They’re a clothing company, not like Amnesty international. Ads like that don’t sell clothes,” wrote Katie, 21, on Conservative Perspective. “It’s totally random and they do it just to make statements for the sake of making statements.”
These sorts of controversial statements are nothing new to Benetton. Here’s a list compiled by the Guardian on some of Benetton’s most controversial, and powerful, ad campaigns from the last 18 years:
- 1993 – Photo of David Kirby, an HIV Positive patient, as he lay dying in hospital.
- 1996 – Image of three hearts with the words white, black and yellow written over each of them.
- 2003 – “An arresting image of an amputee with a spoon attached to his limb.”
- 2006 – Photo of an ape staring into the camera with the name “James” added.
- 2008 – A Tibetan monk prays with a Chinese soldier.
Photo from nomatterwhatnow
