UK watchdog criticises magazine campaign for SwankPoker.com for linking betting to sexual success.
Monday 29th June 2009
The UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled against online poker site SwankPoker.com and its magazine advert featuring a woman cupping her breasts under the strapline ‘Will you hold this pair for me?’.
The magazine campaign ran in poker title Flush and promised ‘hot action’ to online gamblers where ‘your favourite girl will play as you tell her to’.
An accompanying advertorial promotion positioned SwankPoker.com as ‘the very best in poker action coupled with the finest erotic entertainment that the civilised world has to offer’. It told readers that the female online poker players featured in the service were ‘not your alter egos’ but ‘bring enough action to the Swank tables and the next thing you know, she could be taking care of your wildest fantasies’. Rewards included ‘serious erotic action’ and ‘the opportunity to star in a movie with them’.
According to a report from The Guardian newspaper, the Remote Gambling Association (RGA) complained to the ASA that the adverts linked gambling to seduction and sexual success. The RGA also argued that the campaign was not socially responsible, particularly in relation to protecting children and ‘other vulnerable persons’ from being exploited by gambling commercials.
SwankPoker.com denied the allegations and stated that ‘instead of offering caps and T-shirts’ it presented rewards that were legally sold ‘but which happened to be of an adult nature’. The company also asserted that it clearly advertised its services as for adults only.
However, the ASA ruled that the adverts breached its code for linking gambling to sexual success and stated that these should not appear again.
The RGA had also protested that the adverts could target young and vulnerable people but this was rejected by the ASA because they appeared in a magazine targeting 25 to 40-year-olds.
