Subway Ad Asks Women If They're 'Beach Body Ready', Feminists Respond By Vandalising It
A controversy has erupted over a poster ad put up on London Underground (London's subway network) by a company called Protein World who sell supplements to help people lose weight and stay in shape.
The campaign shows a woman in a bikini with the slogan "Are You Beach Body Ready?" (#beachbodyready) —and it's made a lot of people very angry indeed. They're calling it "body shaming" and not only has an online petition calling for its removal got over 50,000 supporters, but women have taken to vandalising the ads and taking photos of themselves showing their distaste for it.
There's also a counter campaign #EachBodysReady which has its own Facebook page. And a demonstration is set to take place this weekend in London.
But while people have been getting infuriated with the ad, the company behind it are not backing down, instead they're gloating about all the free publicity it's given them.
Here's some of the defacing, protest graffiti, and other responses to the posters that's been taking place.
You're god damn right and I are beach body ready. No help needed, we're #alreadyperfect. #bodypositive
Meanwhile Protein World have been defending the ads and replying to the protesters through their Twitter account. Along with retweeting the support they've been getting.
and it's ok to be fat and out of shape instead of healthy? We are a nation of sympathisers for fatties #doesnthelpanyone
The CEO of Protein World, Arjun Seth, has branded the protesters "terrorists" and says he'll take action if the petition gets to one million signatures.
While their head of marketing Richard Staveley, has said: "We want to encourage discussion on this. Ultimately we want to encourage a healthier, fitter nation. We want to encourage everybody to be the very best version of themselves. It’s been quite odd how many people we’ve found who are far quicker to fit shame then fat shame. And, you know, if that makes us bad, then so be it.
There’s more than two and a half million people who use London Underground every day and sales have considerably jumped, so regardless of that 40,000 I think I can comfortably say that we’ve had ... it’s been better for us, there’s been far more positive reaction than negative."