Pink Hitler posters provoke fury
Giant posters of Hitler dressed in bright pink, with a love heart in place of a swastika, have provoked a furious debate in Italy.
Hitler poster in Palermo
The 18ft high posters of the Nazi leader advertise a line of clothing for young people and adorn street corners and bus stops in Palermo, Sicily's biggest city.
The ads show the Fuhrer in a lurid pink uniform, with his swastika armband replaced with one bearing a bright red heart, above the slogan "Change Style – Don't Follow Your Leader".
Many local people say the advertising campaign is offensive and have called for the posters to be taken down.
A city councillor with the centre-Left Democratic Party, Rosario Filoramo, has protested to the mayor of Palermo.
"The use of an image of a person responsible for the worst chapters of the last century is offensive to our country's constitutional principles and to the sensitivities of citizens," he said.
A council official, Fabrizio Ferrandelli, said: "Having Hitler's face on a poster... cannot be passed off as an innocent advertising message. Seeing these posters in front of schools is an embarrassment." But the advertising agency which came up with the idea said critics of the campaign were over-reacting.
The Hitler poster was a tongue-in-cheek way of encouraging young people not to follow the crowd in their fashion choices.
BULLSHIT!
It's clear the pink Hitler is supposed to be "cool", after all, he has an armband which signifies "love".
If Hitler is not supposed to represent coolness in this ad, then are we supposed to also think "love" is not cool?
This ad agency went for shock value, in order to drum up a bunch of free PR. However, they are betraying themselves as people who are almost completely lacking in a basic understanding of the pain involved in the history of WWII.
10 comments:
I think the ad agency knew what it was doing. People are paying attention to the company - and no matter what happens, it emerged from obscurity.
However, if the people who worked on the campaign were like some of my friends, and they had lost half their families in the Holocaust, they would not think this a fitting way to drum up free PR.
Pastorius,
I'm not one to support censorship, but I hope the the guy who created this offensive picture comes to realize how incentive his work is holocaust survivors and their families.
By the way, I have a feeling that Hitler would actually send the guy who create that picture of him to a concentration camp, if he created in while in Germany when Hitler controlled the country. Oh the irony.
You need the culture to provide the educational, and experience base to birth an advertising agency which imagines this message will resonate.
This is an indictment of what Italy has taught it's young people for 60 years
I agree, Epa.
If anyone has ever read Don Delillo's White Noise, they'd know that he essentially predicted this kitsch-ization of Hitler in that novel.
Wow.. you are worried about the pain of WW but when it comes to Muslims everything is so hunky dory.. double standard is not a good standard to have.
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