Need help with a very sensitive complaint against a massive multinational!

[MrsRickman]

Ok, here goes.
Coca Cola are running a promo via their Dr Pepper brand just now on facebook. It is called 'status takeover' and involves the application putting an embarrassing or funny status on your FB page.
My 14 yo dd participated and I was HORRIFIED to log into FB and see that her status read - 'I watched 2 girls one cup and felt hungry afterwards'. For anyone who doesn't know what this means, please stay ignorant, for those who do, you can imagine how I felt. This was compounded later on when a quick search through dds internet history revealed she had tried to find out what it was for herself. Thankfully, our ISP has a wonderful child filter!!
So, after various emails and phonecalls to CocaCola marketing I have been offered (quite offensively) as way of compensation, a night in a hotel and theatre tickets for the West End. Fat lot of use to me, we live in Glasgow.
So, how do I proceed? ASA? I am absolutely fizzing with rage and disgust, and want a full apology and explanation. CocaCola are saying they use outside marketing teams for different brands and it's outside their jurisdiction. Help!?

gagamama

It is hideously distressing to think of my dd (or any 14 year old) viewing that porn. I had never heard of it an hour ago, and my only information about it is from this thread (I do not dare google) and it has bloody well upset me.

Yes we know oh earnest ones that we cannot police the internet, however we do need to stop large companies from this kind of mindless marketing campaign which drops hard core torture (because from the spunds of it this is what it is) into the laps of teenagers, and opens them up to risk by encouraging them to make thier FB profiles PUBLIC (which to me is the main point here).

111Drew111 says "I don't see what the problem is with a 14 year old seeing it in comparison to some of the stuff on the internet".

This is what the whole problem is!!!!! Do you really think that children should be looking at hard core porn on the interent just because there is always something worse to look at???

We can chose to have a parental filter on our home computers and try to prevent our children looking at hard core porn. Yes, 14 year old girls are still children, and we do want to prevent our children looking at horrific images such as these.

We do not expect large, respected companies to post such references on our children's facebook pages.

Might i also point out, after having a look through your other threads on this site, I came across this. Should we ban children access to this site as well?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1005151-to-think-that-giving-one-s-DH-a -BJ

Agreed, Lenin. This isn't about what is ok on the internet and what is not ok on the internet (tho I think Jimbo is wrong about that too). It is about what is acceptable for Coke to do to market its product to an audience including children.

Forgot to add - esp for dittany - I used the following as the subject of my e-mail:

Dr Pepper competition put teenagers "at risk"

If BBC News website uses the same, I think it might get some prompt rewrites on Guardian and Telegraph websites !

(Dittany: my 45 year old dh read this thread this morning. He works in the media in a very laddish environment. He is a journalist. He had never heard of 2g1c and says "my God, I wish I didn't know that existed". Whereas I did know of it - courtesy of a thread on Mumsnet where posters were discussing it, about a year ago. Iirc I was admonished for being po-faced when I objected at the time).

The difference being....when MNers talk about sex, MNHQ does not immediately post updates on our children's Facebook pages advising them to pop over here and read what mummy and daddy might be getting up to.

Po-faced?

"The difference being....when MNers talk about sex, MNHQ does not immediately post updates on our children's Facebook pages advising them to pop over here and read what mummy and daddy might be getting up to."

It mentions sex during a period, sex in return for money (prostitution) etc. You all should be looking a bit closer to home for your things to get angry about.

Jimbo, a lot of parents get Net Nanny or similar to stop their children accessing unsuitable stuff on the internet so there is not so much a need to make the whole internet 18+, but Facebook is for 13 year olds upwards so parents would not have expected their children to be exposed to hardcore porn on there! If Facebook had made their regulations that you have to be 18 then that would be different.

We can promote a new take on the "having a Diet Coke break": I'm having an open-ended break from Coke products.

(I am just making an aside to Dittany who was arguing earlier that all the men I know are likely to have heard of this video, thats all.)

For the record, I work in the IT industry and DO NOT condone multi-national companies using shock porn to advertise to children (or adults). Multi-national companies should have safe guards in place to make sure advertising campaigns meet certain standards of decency. No one is asking for the internet to be policed but for advertisers to use some tact when targeting children.

x posted

New Statesman has a precis based on Guardian article and because it is only a precis, actually is a slightly stronger piece against Coca-Cola.

I agree with some of the arguments in this thread, children should be protected from things like 2 girls 1 cup, but might I also point out that your own page is adorned with adverts for makeup, clothing etc. I'm not about to do a study, but how many of the clothing shops which advertise on this page sell inappropriate clothing for children; bikinis etc. How many chlidren cover their faces in makeup, trying to achieve the unobtainable look airbrushed onto women in the magazines which advertise on your page? Just something to think about.

Was wondering when the trolls would descend...

MrsRickman Any more communication from the company?

I think some sick individual in the marketing company or in coca cola snuck in a phrase like this. I would call for an investigation and would want nothing less than the person who wrote this into the program to be fired & / prosecuted.

Jimbo - so glad you've brought these ideas to our attention. I'd like to point you in the direction of our Let Girls be Girls campaign, I'm sure you will be able to make a valuable contribution.

We are not saying that all mentions of/videos of 2 girls 1 cup should be removed from the internet.

We are saying that it should not be referenced in an advertising campaign, aimed at teens, on Facebook.