 |
|
Michael’s July 1st single showed Blair as a poodle being petted on the White House lawn by Bush.
|
LONDON,
November 27 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – A team of satirists
were asked to seek U.S. president George Bush’s permission before
being rude about him, a U.K. newspaper reported Wednesday, November 27.
The
Guardian said that
the Broadcast Advertising Clearance Center
(BACC), which screens television ads before they are broadcast said the
“promotion of the Christmas video of ITV1’s award-winning animation
show 2DTV was offensive because it questioned the U.S. president’s
intelligence.”
According
to the watchdog, Bush’s approval is needed before the ad is cleared.
In
the cartoon advert, Bush is shown “opening a copy of the video,
exclaiming “my favorite - just pop it in the video player”. But he
places it in a toaster, and the tape burns to a crisp.”
The
team also produced another advert for the product in which England
football captain David Beckham was shown making his Christmas list and
asking his wife: “Victoria, how do you spell DVD?” That advert too
was deemed “too offensive” by the BACC, the Guardian said.
The
reason, the BACC gave was that they “contravened the independent
television commission code of practice because it was “offensive” to
Mr. Bush,” the Guardian said.
The
ITC advertising code says: “With limited exceptions, living people
must not be portrayed, caricatured or referred to in advertisements
without their permission.”
The
paper quoted Giles Pilbrow, the 2DTV producer, dismissing the request to
seek Bush's permission saying: “It’s an idiotic request – we’d
write a letter to Bush, but I doubt he could read it. Anyway the Bush
joke was innocuous – we’re much harder hitting about the president
on the TV show.”
In
addition the BACC told the produces that both Saddam Hussein or Osama
bin Laden could not be featured in an advert if the joke was deemed
“offensive” to them, reported the Guardian.
This
was slammed by Pilbrow who said: “This is a ridiculous state of
affairs - the ITC code is not there to protect the likes of these
despots. The BACC should not apply the code so blindly,” the paper
reported.
2DTV
were behind British pop star George Michael’s single which was
released on July 1 titled “Shoot the Dog” which caused controversy
for showing British Prime Minister Tony Blair as a poodle being petted
on the White House lawn by Bush.
The
video and lyrics of the song warned of the danger of the cozy
relationship between Blair and Bush, in the light of the September 11
attacks.
On
its site, 2DTV said that George Michael is a huge fan of the hit TV
series, and approached the 2DTV producers directly to capture him in
cartoon form.
