Malaysia hates Brad

**DankNstickY** · 12-23-2002, 02:02 PM

Malaysia bans car ad featuring Brad Pitt for bruising Asian egos
Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Malaysia announced Monday it has banned a car advertisement featuring actor Brad Pitt, saying that the producers have degraded Asians by picking the Hollywood heart-throb over local personalities.

Deputy Minister of Information, Zainuddin Maidin, said that the advertisement, which features Pitt driving one of carmaker Toyota's latest car model, was discontinued after it donned local newspapers and enjoyed air-time on local television several months back.

"We banned that ad because it was considered an insult to Asian people."

"Why must we use (Caucasian) looks in our advertisements? Why, are our men not handsome?" Zainuddin was quoted as saying by the official Bernama news agency.

He urged advertising companies not to use Pan-Asian looks for their printed or electronic productions, but to hire locals for their models.

"This is the responsibility of the advertisers ... (otherwise), they are planting a sense of low self-esteem among Asians."

Zainuddin said the government had already enforced a ruling stating that all locally-shown advertisements have to feature local talents, but of late, many advertising companies had been flouting the rules.

Linkage

is it really that big a deal???

**whitak24** · 12-23-2002, 03:17 PM

that is retarded. if their self-esteem is damaged that easily, then i think there are other problems at work

**Nija** · 12-23-2002, 03:24 PM

Well, at least I'm not the only one

**gear02** · 12-23-2002, 08:19 PM

That's really retarded...and I'm Asian too...

**Showtime** · 12-23-2002, 09:32 PM

good job malasia!

that'll teach brad. now he has to go home to hollywood and his movies and his wife.............

seriously, i think thats cool for them. people should look up at buildboards etc and see successful, good looking people of their own ethnicity. its better than having people bahaive like those asian barbies in japan. though as a guy thats cool to be around too.

in L.A. you find every kind of spokeperson pushing everything. i'd like to more spanish people cuz there are so many latinos here.

-jel

**cheapie** · 12-23-2002, 09:51 PM

what an effing crock! it's an ad for crying out loud! advertisers use spokespeople that they feel will ellicit a desired reponse out of the target audience. should i be pissed that buick uses tiger woods as a spokesperson even though the overwhelming majority of potential buyers are white? nope. it's all about name recognition.

if we followed this example, i would only see billboards or commercials with white people in them. that's pretty boring. the vast majority of people in my city are white and i guarantee the commercials i see don't reflect this. and that's fine with me. you can't engineer or legislate every aspect of society.

**sbp** · 12-23-2002, 10:16 PM

Brad Armpit.

Its nothing new for Hollywood actors to hock products in other markets.

I concur whitak24. The seeds of discontent stem from other problems. Low self-esteem in Deputy Minister of Information Zainuddin Maidin and jealous others may explain this illfounded banning.

"people should look up at buildboards etc and see successful, good looking people of their own ethnicity." Can't people admire someone no matter what the ethnicity?

**cheapie** · 12-23-2002, 10:34 PM

now don't crack on brad. while i'm not a big movie star fan, he did great in some of my favorite movies, fight club, snatch, and ocean's eleven.

**DankNstickY** · 12-23-2002, 11:34 PM

i think people are spending too much time bitching about little things like that.

i think they have a point about wanting to see people of their own ethnicity, but come on - don't tell me every ad in the country has a white/black/hispanic/non-malaysian person on it.

like cheapbast@rd said, it'd be freakin boring if there was no variety.

**ArkiStan** · 12-24-2002, 06:41 AM

"Why must we use (Caucasian) looks in our advertisements? Why, are our men not handsome?"

Next thing you know, they'll be asking...

"Why must we use Toyota cars in our Toyota car advertisements? Why are OUR cars not handsome?"