A German condom advertisement portraying caricatures of Mao Zedong, Adolf Hitler and Osama bin Laden has inflamed Chinese sentiments.
A German condom advertisement portraying caricatures of Mao Zedong, Adolf Hitler and Osama bin Laden as human spermatozoa, and implicitly promoting condom use to avert giving birth to mass murderers, has inflamed Chinese sentiments.
The set of three print ads for a new line of condoms for Doc Morris Pharmacies bear no text, only iconic caricatures of the three leaders represented as human sperm: Mao is distinguishable by his distinctive hair-do. The ad message is self-evident, notes Adweek editor David Gianatasio: “Use a condom, and be sure you’re not bringing the next Osama bin Laden, Adolf Hitler or Mao Zedong into the world.”
The juxtaposition of Mao, who for all his faults remains a Chinese national hero, with history’s most chilling dictator Hitler and most dreaded terrorist bin Laden, has triggered anger in China. On the website of the nationalist Chinese publication Huanqiu Shibao (Global Times), commentators described the equation of Mao with Hitler as an “insult to our great Han nation”.
A post on Sina.com, one of China’s biggest Chinese-language portals, reads: “Mao Zedong is a Chinese hero for having driven invaders from China: we won’t tolerate such insults.” Others wondered why the ad agency, Grey Worldwide, hadn’t featured George W. Bush (who has been criticised for the tens of thousands killed in the war on Iraq).
Although Mao is blamed for the deaths of millions of Chinese during the ruinous Great Leap Forward (in the 1950s) and the Cultural Revolution (from 1966 to 1976), in official Communist Party narratives, he is still revered as a national hero who was “30% wrong and 70% right.”
Last year, French carmaker Citreon had to withdraw and apologise for an ad that featured a digitally altered image of Mao after protests from Chinese Netizens. In China, a domestic brand of condoms featuring Mao’s image had to be withdrawn after complaints that it attempted to profiteer from perceptions that Mao had a ravenous sexual appetite.
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