Ladbrokes ad caused "serious offence", says ASA
World Cup ad featuring Christ the Redeemer statue in a purple Betdaq robe deemed inappropriate by the advertising watchdog
Ladbrokes has been reprimanded by the Advertising Standard Authority (ASA) for causing serious offence with an advert it ran during the World Cup for its online subsidiary Betdaq in which the Christ the Redeemer statue was featured wearing Betdaq colours.
The advert, which ran on the Betdaq website, showed a digitally enhanced image of the statue in Rio de Janeiro wearing a purple robe with Betdaq superimposed on to it. Text on the advert stated: “World Cup 2014 “ Bet with Betdaq.”
The advert received a single complaint, with the complainant saying the use of an image of Jesus Christ to promote gambling would cause offence to Christians.
Ladbrokes said that it did not intend for the ad or the use of the image to cause offence, and that as a result of the complaint had removed the ad from the website and would not use it again.
In its assessment the ASA said it understood the Christ the Redeemer statue was a well-known landmark in Rio de Janeiro and was therefore likely to be “understood as a reference to the city and the location of the 2014 World Cup”.
However the advertising authority said it also understood the image of Jesus was likely to “hold religious connotations for believers”.
Although the statue was not seen taking part in gambling, the ASA said it featured the logo and colour scheme of a betting company and “featured a prominent role in an ad for a gambling service”.
The ad therefore created an association between Christ and gambling and was therefore likely to “cause serious offence to some visitors to the website”.
Ladbrokes was told the ad must not appear again in its current form, and to take care in future when using religious imagery.
“Betdaq ran this as a tongue in cheek ad focusing on Christ the redeemer as synonymous with Rio and the World Cup. On receiving complaints that associating the image with gambling was upsetting to Christians we removed the image and have ceased using the ad,” a Ladbrokes spokesperson said.
“In short, ahead of this decision we had already responded to feedback and we apologise to anyone who felt offended.”
The decision sees Ladbrokes become the latest online gambling operator to come under fire from the ASA for its World Cup ads after Sporting Index had its knuckles wrapped over an advert featuring Christ the Redeemer and a bikini-clad woman.