In being completely appalled by this attitude to Oscar Pitorius' trial?

[perfectstorm]

So Paddy Power have decided to run a poster campaign and national media ad campaign on whether Oscar Pitorius is convicted of killing his girlfriend, complete with an image of him as an Oscar award, and the slogan " "It's Oscar Time. Money Back If He Walks." Their blog says, "Global media attention, bar-stool conversation and pillow talk will shift from the Oscars on Sunday night to Oscar on Monday when the Blade Runner straps on his prosthetic limbs for the long walk to the high court."

I don't know if it was an accident or whether he murdered her, but does it actually matter? A young woman is dead, this is a murder trial, and they think it's casual entertainment people can take a flutter on, akin to the sodding Oscars.

Are they run by David Brent?

Yes we understand all of that. Which is why the casual attitude to domestic violence is so damaging.

Racist jokes are not meaningless. They create an environment where racist violence is more likely and possible. Same for jokes surrounding rape, DV, murder.

The ends don't justify the means of this campaign.

I think the poster campaign is horrible.

The fact you can place a bet on a trial outcome bothers me less. Yes, it's in bad taste but so are a lot of things.

I'd like to think you're right Sauce but I suspect not. I fully expect that whoever created this campaign (a massive success worldwide, despite being launched in one (?) country) is on for a huge bonus this year. I think their means will be pretty good.

Actually where this all went wrong is the massive publicity around the whole event. The campaign would be meaningless if your man in the street who barely glances at the news had never heard about it. As it is, you'd have to have been in a hole for the last year not to know about it.

This trial is different though. For reasons unbeknown to me, we've elevated celebrities to another plain. Most of the people we celebrate do little, if anything, to deserve it.

If the campaign was about Dave from Luton who'd given his girlfriend Debbie a good hiding, then people would, I suspect, feel differently. This particular case is just too far removed from us mere mortals.

I doubt the campaign was actually intended to get people to bet on the trial (although some will have). It's purpose was to create profile which unfortunately it has done very successfully.

I'm not sure that having worked at an insurance brokers means that you'll necessarily understand how advertising works.

I used to work for an investment bank, which means I know all about columbian basket weaving.

No, I think that in UK, no-one has used DV for anything in this instance because we have the ASA and it wouldn't be allowed.

I do think it was very damaging for an overseas campaign to have been given so much unnecessary time in UK.

If you want to campaign in the countries where this is allowed, then that would be useful.

Technical and Contrarian,
So we best sit back and ignore misogyny / exploitation / women hating etc in case we give the perpetrators free publicity? Or because it means that a company have succeeded if I'm offended? An interesting intellectual argument, but give me a moral position every time. The campaign stinks and just because there are some without a moral compass doesn't mean that society should sit back and allow them to set our common values.
This is so wrong.

This is getting a little silly now (I'm partly to blame). I don't think anyone's advocating domestic violence.

People really ought to understand that campaigns like this, if you don't approve of them, ought to be starved of the oxygen of publicity - which you're giving them.

Isn't it more of a bet on a judicial system. I've seen threads on here about woody Allen and Oscar with everyone giving their pretrial verdicts in 'who done it' way.

The campaign clear works.

'People really ought to understand that campaigns like this, if you don't approve of them, ought to be starved of the oxygen of publicity - which you're giving them.'

You really ought to understand that lots of people disagree wholeheartedly with this statement.

Where their primary purpose is to get free publicity, yes.

I'm fairly liberal honest guv but I know that freedom of expression means that I'm likely to be offended at some point.

No, you must challenge them and let it be known that if you advocate this type of thing, well, that's your look out but most right-thinking people will think you're a twat.

Like I said earlier, how does this kind of thing become culturally unacceptable unless we speak against it? Just quietly ignoring isn't going to stop twats from being twats. Knowing they'll be called on it may do.

Why is it that we make progress and rightly shun people for cracking the odd paki joke, the old shirt-lifters jokes, but DV is the one thing that people won't tackle. Because women are seen as fair game.

Absolutely, we're allowed to hold conflicting views. You have the right to take offence, others have the right not to.

Unless there's an incitement to cause direct harm.....

"Unless there's an incitement to cause direct harm....."

I consider a bunch of Neanderthals standing about in a marketing office laughing at a woman's violent death pretty harmful. Not directly, no, but it does perpetuate a culture where it's a laughing matter.

You tackle the smaller things first...

Exactly!

How many armchair detectives will be dissecting the trial on Mumsnet though? They don't know the deceased or the accused yet they are gripped by the details.

That's entertainment. They won't admit it and will tell themselves it's because a young woman died, he's a fallen hero and they are just trying to make sense of it blah blah Truth is, it's a live episode of Columbo for them.