Tuesday 8 September 2009

You Been Telling Porkies, WWF?


Just a quickie.

Remember the WWF 9/11 video that Mr Eugenides posted which was quickly taken down?

Remember that the WWF denied they had anything to do with the ad at all?

Remember they were going after anyone who posted anything like this about it?

Well, it seems they have changed their tune.

After the WWF appeared to initially deny approving the ad, DDB Brasil and the WWF hammered out a statement posted in Portuguese on both groups' Brazilian websites Wednesday afternoon apologizing for the ad and attributing it to "the inexperience of some professionals on both sides, and not bad faith or disrespect toward American suffering."

The statement continued, "WWF-Brasil and DDB Brasil reaffirm that the ad never should have been created, approved or run. They deeply regret that this happened, and apologize to everyone who has been offended."

They all still deny that they knew anything about the video though. Apparently, it was just a strange coincidence that someone managed to condense their idea into a perfect 30 second slot with professional production.



So that's all right, then.




9 comments:

The Filthy Smoker said...

The World Wrestling Federation will do anything for publicity these days

Mark Wadsworth said...

FS beat me to it.

Sue said...

I think they should change their acronym to WTF!

It just shows you, the Righteous have no qualms about to what depths of distaste and depravity they will go to, to ensure their continued funding and existence!

Unknown said...

First time I've actually watched that video Dick, what a bunch of bastards the WWF are. Didn't I read that the WWF was involved with the NWO conspirators?

BTS said...

Okay, so I know that I'm going to get grief for this but.. I think the advert makes quite a good point.

Before I get beaten over the head repeatedly with a panda (or Hulk Hogan if you like) I ought to explain slightly. Whether or not one supports the idea/ethos behind the advert I think it is fair to say that people do perhaps need reminding of the scale of the tsunami and it does convey this quite vividly.

If anyone has been looking at the television guide recently they'll have noticed programmes and films about 9/11 all over the place. We don't have a week of stuff dedicated to what was (and still is) a much larger catastrophe.

Oliver Stone cashed in with the atrocious World Trade Centre movie and there was another film (Flight 93) about the passengers who fought back against their hijackers.

Perhaps I'm just jaded about getting 9/11 rammed down my throat every year, but I tend to view such things as either being private and personal to those concerned or, as seems to have happened in this case, it is adopted by an entire nation/s.

As I said, whether you agree with WWF's issues or not is up to you, but as an advert it does make it's point.

I'm still puzzled by the lack of oiled men with bulging biceps clad in spandex though..

Dick Puddlecote said...

If the earthquake which caused the tsunami was man-made, I could understand it, BTS.

However, this just screams "look at us, we're more important than those 9/11 victims", with accompanying video trivialising the deaths in New York.

Simon Fawthrop said...

"the inexperience of some professionals"

That's one hell of an oxymoron and speaks volumes about the sort of people who manage and work for these organisations.

BTS said...

Dick, I agree that for them to conflate plate tectonics and climate change is disingenuous to say the least and I appreciate that point and probably ought to have mentioned it myself.

What I would have suggested, as the advert does appear to be a working title, would be to ditch that phony link and use it at the end of the year to give people a bit of a reminder.

I don't really see why the WWF would have commissioned the ad in the first place really, but as a stand-alone advert it is very effective in the message that it conveys.

I appreciate that it could be viewed as trivialising the 9/11 deaths, it's just that I looked at it from the opposite view as giving quite a vivid piece of imagery which seeks to evoke the scale of the effects of the tsunami.

As I mentioned, I think the films made about the WTC attacks do a far worse job of trivialising the incidents.

So get rid of the spurious climate change link and the WWF from it and you are left with a piece of work which gives a sense of scale more than anything, which I believe has value in the sense that it's awfully hard to visualise numbers as high as 280,000.

I'm not sure I can adequately explain myself without an entire essay so I may have to get back to work now..

BTS said...

I think I've just worked out a simpler way of putting it: by the wrong people, for the wrong reasons, but very effective.