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BOOKMAKERS PADDY POWER have been ordered to withdraw a controversial newspaper advertisement featuring Oscar Pistorius after it became the most complained-about ad ever in Britain.
Around 5,200 people have so far complained about the advertisement after an online campaign in Britain which saw more than 124,000 people sign a petition against it.
The advertisement showed an image of an Academy Awards statuette which had the face of Oscar Pistorius, who is currently on trial for the premeditated murder of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.
The text read “It’s Oscar Time” and “Money Back If He Walks” and said the bookmakers would refund all losing bets on the trial if Pistorius is found not guilty.
The Advertising Standards Authority in Britain said it is investigating whether the ad is offensive for trivialising the issues surrounding a murder trial and the death of a woman.
The watchdog said it was taking the unusual step of ordering Paddy Power to withdraw the ad from circulation pending the outcome of an investigation.
“We consider the ad may be seriously prejudicial to the general public on the ground of the likely further serious and/or widespread offence it may cause,” the ASA said in a statement.
The Advertising Standards Authority of Ireland has also received a number of complaints about the advertisement.
As of this morning, Paddy Power is still taking bets on the verdict in the Pistorius trial on its website under the Novelty Bets section.
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Lots of publicity: mission accomplished
Paddy powers taking a leaf out of Ryan airs book.no such thing as bad publicity.
Making Publicity out of a woman’s murder
@dan do you think he’s innocent?
Any odds on the Anglo trial….a little flutter always it more interesting.
@Jaymie I’m talking about paddy power
Scaldbag why oh why did you have to mention that it has nothing to do with it.can you not think of anything else man!!!
Yes dan you should use every opportunity to your advantage. O Leary rang Boeing the day of 9-11 to ask for their best price on 100 jets as he knew the company was in turmoil. I think this is just great business sense.
Meanwhile acres of newsprint and hours of tv news treat the story like porn, picking over every disturbing detail with voyeuristic relish.
At least Paddy Power doesn’t pretend to be classy and just goes for the dirty essence of what every other media outlet is hawking to its customers.
Here, here, I thought I was the only one who noticed the blatant hypocrisy of the media and joe-soap. Mob mentality eejits with no depth, sure they can notice betting is wrong, but fail to see every news network and print squeezing every cent they can with lots of tabloid level speculation, reenactments, HD Specials…etc etc
How would paddy power feel if his wife was murdered and ladbrokes were taking bets on the trial
Have you seen the ad? It’s a money back special if he “walks”. It’s talking the piss out of him more than anything. People need to learn to get less offended over nothing.
Pride is how they would feel, business goes on and never miss an opp
Paddy Power the betting Version of Ryanair…
A sh1t load of free publicity yet again…
Priceless…
Joe Duffy will be beating his chest about this later. He had PP on the other day and was roaring at him with righteous indignation.
That’s his normal voice. You should hear him when he gets indignant.
Paddy power has the same swagger as Michael o leary. They both are great businessmen. Both are ruthless. But you probably have to be if you want to stay at the top.
Personally i think the campaign is marketing genius. He has generated huge publicity. Thats what he wanted. Result.
But it was blatently and unashamedly offensive to the families involved (who in fairness may never see the ad). And offensive to disabled people and families of murder victims.
And paddy power laughed just like hunky doreys laughed at all those women’s groups. O Leary sends the calendar to every woman noted as a feminist and every woman’s group- I think it’s fantastic. Marketing now is being thought this way and I can only say it’s a good thing. Imagine the SF hunger strikes we could haves knocked even more fun out of that doing odds like a horse race, it would be fantastic
No surprise there. Paddy Power will do anything to play on the weakest people in society who have gambling addictions in order to get as much money out of them as possible. All the talk is of alcohol problems affecting society but nothing about the huge issues that exist due to gambling addictions. Even with high profile sports stars like Keith Gillespie and Oisin Maconville speaking and writing abiut their own addictions and the huge issues it haa caused them and their families, no reply from government im fact they continue to champion the gambling industry with the Taoiseach himself recently opening a new PP online gambling office! Shocking..online gambling is a true societal scurge…people with addictions gambling their income that they cannot even physically see, away into the coffers of PP
Thanks for pointing out the morality of gambling
If only some people had a sense of humour.
How is taking bets on a murder trial funny ?
Some things are not to be joked about. A woman is dead and 2 families are ruined.
Not laughing at it won’t bring her back to life.
@in-Zane when a member of your family whom you love dies feel free to laugh your head off! Not going to bring them back and will save you buying tissues.
We buried my grandfather in a clown suit. Twas a great laugh
@Vincent
Are you a member of the young woman’s family, if not you are just bandwagon jumping
Lots of righteous indignation.
Dan I agree completely ..Murder has never been a funny word , it’s a sad world we live in ; (
To be fair he hasn’t a leg to stand on!
Heard it
It won’t be the first time he’s been told he won’t walk
While we, wonderful decent Irish people still allow this disgusting ad to remain.
I better still get my money back if he bounces out of there
Stay classy PP! I wonder did they know they’d be talked about so much…….
Called them yesterday for odds on their shares taking a hit , they were nt betting on that , so I had my little say and closed my account.
Respect Peter!!!
The marketing manager is worth their weight in gold, absolutely fantastic
I can’t really see the difference between Paddy Power trying to cash in on it and the fact that it’s being televised to the world to be honest!
That’s taking the Piss!!Should have got an Oscar for it being so Dramatic.
Exactly what PP wanted, articles about this everywhere. Morals aside, this is fantastic advertising yet again
Ya can still bet in it, I did :D
And the bookies win again.
?
The sad thing is people in SA have to carry guns 24/7 because there incompetent Government can’t control the murders of innocent civilians
i’ve been a customer for over 20 years and when i wrote to them this week they told me the bet was about the court case and not about the poor girl who was shot. I asked them given that reasoning would they run an ad on the dreadful child rape case in mullingar this week. No answer from Mr Kennedy. Such hypocrisy and arrogance.
what were the odds then?
have your say