The P Word

Pipe · Jan 25, 2007

From today's Wall Street Journal, my new favorite word. Pig.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116969259069387154.html
******

Pigs Get the Ax
In China TV Ads,
In Nod to Muslims
Porcine Prohibition Sends
Marketers Scrambling;
A New Year Complication

By GORDON FAIRCLOUGH and GEOFFREY A. FOWLER
January 25, 2007; Page A1

SHANGHAI -- Next month, China will ring in the Year of the Pig. Nestlé SA planned to celebrate with TV ads featuring a smiling cartoon pig. "Happy new pig year," the ads said.

This week, China Central Television, the national state-run TV network, banned Nestlé's ad -- and all images and spoken references to the animal in commercials, including those tied to the Lunar New Year, China's biggest holiday.

The intent: to avoid offending Muslims, who consider pigs unclean. "China is a multiethnic country," the network's ad department said in a notice sent to ad agencies late Tuesday. "To show respect to Islam, and upon guidance from higher levels of the government, CCTV will keep any 'pig' images off the TV screen."

Suddenly, companies reaching out to China's booming consumer market have a pig problem. The edict has sent Nestlé and others scrambling to adapt to the last-minute rule change, altering spots that had included pigs.

Nestlé is now figuring out what to do with its ads, says its media-buying company MindShare, a unit of WPP Group. "We act in line with any requests that we receive from the authorities" about the content of ads, says Francois-Xavier Perroud, a spokesman for Nestlé.

Coca-Cola Co. says it already had plans to run two versions of its New Year ads, one featuring a cartoon panda and the other a pig. The company says it will be using the pig-free spot, in which a young panda tries to get home to its family for the holidays, on CCTV. The pig ads will run on local TV in markets without significant numbers of Muslim viewers, says a Coca-Cola spokeswoman.

The pig ban is a significant shift for a government that seldom puts the interests of minority groups ahead of those of the broader population. China has more than 20 million Muslims, but they constitute less than 2% of its population.

For most other Chinese, the pig has powerful and positive cultural associations as one of the 12 signs of the Chinese zodiac. Year of the Pig decorations already festoon cities and villages all over China.

Pork is the meat most widely consumed by the country's Han Chinese majority. On average, Chinese annually eat more than 80 pounds of pork , according to United Nations statistics. At banquets in southern China, people often roast whole pigs, decorated with blinking red lights in their eye sockets.

Tens of millions of people have been born in the year of the pig, which occurs every 12 years. People born under the sign of the pig are believed to be happy and honest. Astrologers say this year is held to be especially auspicious for new births.

Pigs symbolize prosperity and good fortune as well as fertility and virility. "Pigs are fat and they mean good luck," says Miao Saiwang, a spokesman for the Bank of China, a commercial lender. In some areas this year, the bank is using the slogan: "Golden pigs bring good fortune."

Chinese TV's ban comes in the wake of the killing of 18 Muslims by police in the country's remote northwest earlier this month. The government accused the men of being terrorists. Muslim activists have called for an independent investigation.

The policy shift offers a window on the inner workings of China's governmental machinery, known for its surprise edicts and abrupt shifts in regulation. It wasn't immediately clear whether the ban applies just to ads or to all TV content. And some analysts said the government could still reverse itself, or offer exceptions to the ban.

Advertising-industry executives in China say senior Communist Party leaders recently told CCTV that references to pigs should be avoided to prevent conflicts among ethnic groups. CCTV's move was then announced to advertisers just as many were finalizing their spots for the holiday, which begins Feb. 18.

The ban could have an impact because CCTV is China's monopoly national broadcast network -- both the biggest media company in the country and the official voice of the Communist Party. Advertisers spent $1.2 billion in 2006 on CCTV air time because programs such as the nightly weather report regularly reach 200 million people.

The message has left advertisers and their agencies rushing to alter ads, or pull them entirely. "I am sure there will be a lot of last-minute overtime work by the creative agencies and production houses," says Bessie Lee, the chief executive of WPP's GroupM China unit, which manages media buying for advertisers.

Ad agencies say they aren't totally surprised by the ruling. Marketers in China often have to contend with a welter of sometimes inconsistent government edicts as Beijing attempts to control the media and popular culture -- though few have struck so directly as the ban on pigs.

While pigs may be banned in China's TV ads, the 'Year of the Pig' stamp set was issued for the Lunar New Year.
In recent years, regulators have banned ads for breast enhancement and reality TV shows that feature people under the age of 18. Last year CCTV banned some ads for infant milk formula after the government launched an initiative to encourage breast-feeding.

"This is all about the government positioning itself as the patriarchal protector of the people," says Tom Doctoroff, the chief executive of the North Asia operations of WPP's JWT ad agency.

Even as CCTV keeps pigs off the air, images of the animal are proliferating in stores as well as in print ads and billboards in anticipation of the New Year holiday. Starbucks Corp. shops in China are selling bright red pig-shaped piggy banks emblazoned with the chain's name, as well as stuffed-animal pigs.

Walt Disney Co., which is making a major push into China after opening a theme park in Hong Kong, is building its marketing efforts for the year around Piglet, Winnie the Pooh's cartoon sidekick. The company says that market research into Chinese culture and traditions led them to prioritize Piglet, who is a lesser character in other markets. "Piglet will be Disney's most eye-catching image throughout 2007 in China," said the company in a statement before the ban. China's postal service has also launched "Year of Piglet" stamps surrounded by images of the character. Disney had no comment on the ban.

Pigs have often been at the center of communal violence between China's Muslim minority and the Chinese majority. Protests ensued when a pig's head was nailed to the door of a mosque several years ago.

Tensions have flared again since security forces killed the 18 accused terrorists in an area -- the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region -- known for Muslim separatist activity. Uighurs are Turkic speaking Muslims who have long bridled at Beijing's rule.

"After an incident like that, the government often tries to make up for it, in an overt propaganda way," says Dru Gladney, an anthropologist at Pomona College in California, who studies China's Muslims. "But nothing in reality changes on the ground."

China closely monitors mosques and Islamic religious schools, and the government has worked to damp Muslim protests over issues that have prompted outcries among Muslims elsewhere, such as a Danish newspaper's publication in 2005 of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad.

"Muslim people hate pigs and don't even mention pigs in their daily lives," says Ma Yunfu, the vice chairman of the China Islamic Association. Mr. Ma said he hadn't been informed of the CCTV ban but views it as "a precaution."

"We don't want to see any misunderstanding like the one 12 years ago," during the last Year of the Pig, says Mr. Ma. At that time, Mr. Ma says, some newspapers published a tale in which a pig saves the life of Muhammad. "That aroused a lot of anger," he says.
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As a wise old man once said, your rights end where my nose begins.

Pig. Pig. Pig.

rhadamanthus · Jan 25, 2007

Psychotic.

MiniMing · Jan 25, 2007

I'm a rat.

RocketMan Tex · Jan 26, 2007

"Potatoes", said Pure Polly Purebread as she poked her porker with a pen.

Hmm · Jan 26, 2007

RocketMan Tex said:

"Potatoes", said Pure Polly Purebread as she poked her porker with a pen.
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I'd pork her..

RocketMan Tex · Jan 26, 2007

Hmm said:

I'd pork her..
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You'd pork Pure Polly Purebread?!?!?!?

You predator!

DonnyMost · Jan 26, 2007

pirc1 · Jan 26, 2007

This is stupid. So Muslims traditions are fine but the thousands of years of Chinese tradition is not? Talk about taking political correctness to the nth degree.

rhadamanthus · Jan 26, 2007

Somebody needs to explain to Muslim people that, despite what they may wish, they are not the only people on the planet.

DaDakota · Jan 26, 2007

rhadamanthus said:

Somebody needs to explain to Muslim people that, despite what they may wish, they are not the only people on the planet.
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Got to love religion.....it is uplifting !!!!

nyquil82 · Jan 26, 2007

Muslim Chinese food is the best Chinese food I've ever had. I can totally understand the unshakable Chinese government bending over since they don't want to risk losing their spiced lamb kebabs.

RocketMan Tex · Jan 26, 2007

nyquil82 said:

Muslim Chinese food is the best Chinese food I've ever had. I can totally understand the unshakable Chinese government bending over since they don't want to risk losing their spiced lamb kebabs.
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Masala Wok........

Major Malcontent · Jan 26, 2007

Extreme Political Correctness.

In China????

Wow.

thegary · Jan 26, 2007

rhadamanthus said:

Somebody needs to explain to adherents of religion, despite what they may wish, they are not the only people on the planet.
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fixed it

rhadamanthus · Jan 26, 2007

thegary said:

fixed it
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Thanks. That is much more accurate.

hotballa · Jan 26, 2007

rhadamanthus said:

Somebody needs to explain to all people whether they are religious or not that, despite what they may wish, they are not the only people on the planet.
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fixed it for thegary

Pipe · Jan 26, 2007

That's the scary part. Not the political correctness, but the current situation that has brought it about. Religious extremists who WANT to be the only people on the planet, think that anyone who is not like them should die, and are willing to kill themselves to accomplish that task.

thegary · Jan 26, 2007

hotballa said:

fixed it for thegary
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no you changed it from a subset of truth to a more general one

hotballa · Jan 26, 2007

thegary said:

no you changed it from a subset of truth to a more general one
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I think it's relevant to you at least =) not that you'd want to get rid of all religious people on earth.

thegary · Jan 26, 2007

hotballa said:

I think it's relevant to you at least =) not that you'd want to get rid of all religious people on earth.
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sorry, what?

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