Banned Body-Shaming ‘Beach Body’ Billboard Lands in NYC
What happens to a controversial weight loss ad that’s been banned in Britain for promoting a nearly impossible-to-achieve body “ideal” for women? It moves to Times Square!
Such is the case for Protein World’s latest campaign, featuring a Victoria’s Secret-esque model clad in a string bikini, along with some images of the brand’s “weight loss collection” (comprised of meal replacements and supplements) and the text, “Are you beach body ready?”
Despite the ad being heavily vandalized and protested after appearing in London Underground stations just last month (a Change.org petition received more than 50,000 signatures, leading to them being removed), it’s now moved across the pond to what’s arguably one of the world’s most prime pieces of advertising real estate.
Situated directly across from Ripley’s Believe It Or Not on 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues, it’s hard to miss the building-size yellow poster (which reportedly cost 50 percent more than the London ads) and the message it’s relaying: Unless your boobs are perky, your waist is tiny, and your thighs don’t touch, your body isn’t “ready” for the beach. Here, now take some diet pills!
The poster in Times Square, NYC.
Perhaps more disturbing than the poster’s new location, itself, is the message that comes along with it, care of Protein World’s head of marketing, Richard Staveley, who called the controversy in London “fantastic.” “I think it’s fair to say we weren’t expecting this level of exposure,” he told Sky News (via Metro).
Ever the modest marketer, Staveley explained that, if it weren’t for the initial UK backlash, the ad may not have made it stateside in the first place. Actually, the fact that it’s even here is a big f–k you to everyone who helped get it banned. He said to Breitbart London,
“[The new poster is a] big middle finger to everybody who bothered to sign that stupid petition in the U.K. It’s a fat F-U to them all. You could say that the London protestors helped pay for the New York campaign.”
Protein World CEO Arjun Seth also joined in on bashing those who felt the ads were body-shaming, calling them “terrorists, you can quote me on that.” Feminists: They simply MUST be stopped!
Unsurprisingly, PR World recently named the ad its “flop of the month,” saying that the worst part of the campaign was the “way Protein World responded to the furore.” Truth: If the sexist poster isn’t enough to discourage women from purchasing products at Protein World, we’d say its PR tactics are!
According to Staveley, the campaign will expand next week to include the New York subway system, much like it did in London. We’re curious to hear peoples’ reactions to it (and see the imminent resulting graffiti treatments it gets) once it reaches such a wide group of people.
What do you think of Protein World’s ad? Is it fat-shaming, or just aspirational? Tell us in the comments.
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