The Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) has decided not to ban the ad for car insurance comparison website Confused.com despite receiving 137 complaints over its implied reference to oral sex.
The ad begins with a robot wheeling up to a parked car speaking through the window, where inside a woman quickly brings her head up from a man’s lap in shock. This little sexual innuendo earned the advert 137 complaints from people complaining it was not suitable for children.
However, the advert already only aired after the 9pm watershed, and whilst there may have been an implied reference to oral sex, there was no nudity or objectification of women to earn a ban.
The ASA said:
We acknowledged that the dishevelled appearance of the couple; the positioning of the woman; the surrounding location; and the reaction of the couple added to that impression. However, we noted the ad contained no explicit reference to sex and no explicit sexual imagery. Whilst we acknowledged that some viewers might find the ad distasteful, we considered it was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence.
