Ad regulators at the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) are calling out Fruity King Casino for sending out a tweet that is, by any standard, incredibly sexist.
The tweet in question was posted on September 8 and the ASA’s description of it in their posted complaint provides a pretty thorough description of it which reads:
A promoted tweet seen on 8 September 2017 featured an image of female presenters in their swimwear from a daytime television show and the text, ‘You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. #LooseWomen18’.
To their credit ProgressPlay, which licenses Fruity King’s casino software, agreed with the ASA and told the company to pull the tweet as soon as possible. They also instructed Fruity King’s social media team to review its policies and procedures.
The company did, however, seem to accept Fruity King’s weak explanation that the tweet was aimed at the overall quality of a certain daytime television that runs in the UK and wasn’t aimed at all women. Fruity King apparently thinks that the show is low quality and that somehow qualifies it as a, “pig.” That said, ProgressPlay did acknowledge that the tweet was clearly offensive and should be removed.
Over at the ASA, however, that argument wasn’t holding much water. In their published response to the claim, they remarked:
Twitter stated their advertising policies prohibited promoted tweets which were low-quality, offensive or hateful and we confirmed that a tweet of this nature would infringe their advertising policies.
UK operators have a rich history of pushing the limits of good taste when it comes to advertising, but they can always count on the ASA to be there