Legal and Ethical Issues In Advertising

I will be analyzing the "Your mom hates dead space 2" campaign put on by EA to advertise their new game (~at the time~) Dead Space 2. the ad features several concerned mothers watching game-play of the highly violent game "dead space 2" and obviously hating it.



this advert is supposed to target people aged 15-20 (the age range can vary a lot more than this, however) and it is made to make them think that their mom will hate the game, making them want it to defy them.
The advert shows clips of the game shooting grotesque alien monsters with guns with plenty of blood and gore to make it an appropriate ad for a violent game. the violence used is very brutal with screaming and loud noises, the reactions are pretty one sided to be negative with the game being blamed for turning children into criminals and corrupting society (really?)

the issues with the ad are quite apparent, the adverts shows the people involved in a negative light for disliking the game. another issue is the violence it shows, the game features small aliens that look rather human and child-like, the ad shows many of them being shot by the protagonist, this could cause offence because of the appearance of the alien. however the context is clear that the protagonist is under attack and it is self defense from the aliens.

an advert that was banned, the 'Death has never been closer' advert for final destination 5 was banned for scaring 3 children on a bus. the difference in the 2 being that the violence in this was obviously on a human, and the fact it was shown on public transport meant it was inappropriate for the audience, whereas in the "your mom hates dead space 2" ads, the violence is being inflicted on aliens and was only shown late at night to typical 'Boyish' shows.

there is a massive need to adverts to stick to a specific set of rules because before the ASA you had all sorts of adverts that showed racial stereotypes and just all-out lied to you, for example coca-cola had a campaign that said if you gave cola to children they would become smarter. the ASA makes sure that a minimal amount of people are offended by an advert, they do this by making sure it is shown at the right time, to the right people and contains no sensitive material that is going to offend a lot of people.