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UK supermarket chain Asda has come in for criticism over its Christmas TV campaign.
Running under the slogan ‘Behind every great Christmas, there’s Mum’, the short sees a mother seemingly struggling alone to prepare the Christmas Day festivities as the rest of the family wait on.
Both women’s and men’s rights groups have claimed that it enforces negative gender stereotypes that are out of place in 2012. So far the Advertising Standards Authority has received 33 complaints.
Pressure group Fathers4Justice has threatened to stage sit-ins at Asda stores if the ads are not pulled.
Mum runs about like headless chicken, with no help from family. Gets asked about the next meal just as she sits down with a glass of wine,” one viewer complained according to the ever-reliable Daily Mail.
And of course, she is knee-deep in kids, a size 8 and not a blonde hair out of place. Who is the dinosaur who approved this ad? How does Asda have the audacity to broadcast this in 2012?”
Asda has pointed out that its own research indicated a positive response to the ad and that it received 22,000 Likes on its Facebook page in the three hours that followed its initial broadcast.
It wasn’t our intention to offend anyone,” a spokesperson added. Our ad depicts what many of the 16m mums who shop in Asda tell us they feel. It is intended to be light-hearted and fun and in the main that’s how it’s been received.”
