South Africa's banned and judged "offensive" "Big John" Chicken Licken TV commercial that the Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB) ordered off of television because it "trivialises" colonialism is now going global with with worldwide attention as people elsewhere like it and sees nothing wrong with it.
Chicken Licken's offensive Big John TV commercial was produced by Joe Public United and Grant de Sousa of They Shoot Films, with Grant de Sousa as director, Darren Gordon as executive producer and actor Lusindiso Zondani in the lead role.
In Chicken Licken's "Big John" TV advert, a modern-day Chicken Licken customer relates the story of a young black South African, John Mjohnana or "Big John", who in 1650 undertook a fantastical journey and eventually finding and "colonising" Europe.
The Advertising Regulatory Board - that recently replaced the bankrupt advertising Standards Authority - in one if its first rulings found that after Sandile Cele complained, that the "Big John" TV commercial amounts to offensive advertising and banned it, saying it's unsuitable for South African viewers.
The Advertising Regulatory Board ruled that "The fact that the commercial is far-fetched and over-the-top does not nullify the potential offense" and that "atrocities suffered by Africans under colonialism are well documented and the legacy thereof continues to exist to date. This experience can never be rewritten differently and cannot be trivialised in any manner".
Chicken Licken plans to lodge an appeal against the Advertising Regulatory Board's ruling.
Meanwhile the "Big John" TV commercial has gone viral globally, racking up global views on YouTube, as well as getting press attention in various international media and in newswire stories.
By Thursday evening the YouTube views of the "Big John" advert has jumped to over 333 000 views online as news services embedded the TV commercial for global viewers watching it online although South African viewers are banned from seeing it on TV in their country.
The newswire services (AP) did a story as did AFP that also syndicated a report, with reports appearing in multiple newspapers and publications and in the news feeds of news services online, ranging from multiple stories in the United Kingdom by the BBC and media there, to India, the United States and Australia, New Zealand and beyond in global media.
Meanwhile overseas TV channels and TV news are having a field day broadcasting actual snippets from and showing the TV commercial that South Africa's Advertising Regulatory Board censored and doesn't want people to see.
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