The new marmite ad: you either love it or hate it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHjssdNNzP0

My knowledge of this started with a flurry of positive Facebook and Twitter updates. ‘Oh,’ I thought, ‘a new Marmite ad that’s up there with the classics‘.

Then info came in of the 278 complaints the ad has received. Apparently people are offended that it seems a bit like a series of real situations where people bust bastards for neglecting children and/or animals.

I wrote quite recently about the nature of offence, so as far as I’m concerned those people can go and fuck themselves up the chuff pipe, but at least a couple of amusing things can be found woven into the fabric of these complaints:

First, one of the problems cited was that the ad was in ‘poor taste’. How wonderfully appropriate.

Then the RSPCA said it understood that “animal lovers are concerned on our behalf. We plan to talk to the makers of Marmite about how we can work together on animal welfare.”

That I cannot wait to see. The only situation I’ve ever heard of that links animals to Marmite involved an unsavoury rumour about a bloke at my school who used to put Marmite on his bollocks and let his dog… You get the idea.

For my part I’m going to have to go against my headline and say that I neither love it nor hate it. I think it’s quite nice.

But never mind what I think. My brain is still addled by the fact that I’m sitting on a tropical island in the Indian Ocean. What do you, the poor, downtrodden wage slaves of the advertising world, think of this ad and its attendant issues?