The G and M Meat Products ads - with the tag line "Beauty Comes From Inside" - were unacceptable, the German Advertising Association said in a report which also attacked another firm's website for using Adolf Hitler as a mascot.
"The understandable interpretation for the observer that a woman was being compared with fresh meat is degrading and highly sexist," the association said in a statement, citing the ruling by its 13-member Advertising "Such corporate propaganda violates the principles of the Advertising Council by discriminating against people and belittling them."
The reprimand was part of a report issued by the board against 30 advertising campaigns in the first half of the year. It said that in 26 cases the admonished companies withdrew their advertisements, one changed the offending campaign and three went ahead despite the council's criticism, leading it to release a statement to the press.
The companies included a genealogy website that used a picture of Nazi dictator Hitler on its homepage in a reference to delving into Germany's wartime past. A computer company was slammed for using the image of a naked woman in profile stretching her arms into the air with the tagline "Game. Set. Match." The Council said the campaign abused female nudity as an eye-catcher "without any clear connection to the product it was advertising." The board called an ad by a furniture company in northern Germany "particularly crass" for showing a woman whose skirt was cut out to reveal her crotch.
The Advertising Council monitors the industry and is a clearinghouse for complaints from the public about offensive or misleading content.
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