Bookies Paddy Power often hit the mark with their intentionally controversial campaigns.
Today… I’m not so sure.
Here’s what @PaddyPower tweeted a few hours ago:
In case you aren’t sure what this is in reference to, it’s alluding to a small number of Chelsea fans that refused to let a black man onto a Paris Métro train, chanting ‘we’re racist and that’s the way we like it’ with the wit of a two year old smearing shit on the fridge.
PP’s stunts are usually controversial whilst retaining a tongue-in-cheek sense of humour that appeals to its intended audience. That’s why all the Mumsnet-moaning and Twitterstorms in the world won’t affect the brand – actual punters just don’t care. They laugh along with the brand’s inside jokes, and more often than not, I do too.
But this? It doesn’t offend me; I’m of the Ricky Gervais ‘offence isn’t given, it’s something you take’ school of thinking. I don’t understand people that get worked up about this sort of thing. It just… isn’t as funny – or as biting a social comment, if that’s what they were going for – (they weren’t) as those behind it imagine it to be.
It is, though, a pretty depressing way for the people who’ve agreed to pose to make a few quid on a Sunday.