BY ORKIDE IZCI

 

ANCHOR MEGAN MURPHY

 

A little too close for comfort. Benetton’s new ‘Unhate’ campaign has drawn fire from the Vatican for what officials there are calling provocative imagery. CNN has the details.

“It really made the Vatican livid. This picture just says it all. Take a look at it. There were a few with various world leaders there kissing one another. You've got Sarkozy smooching Merkel. You've got Hu Jintao and Obama. This is really what outraged the Vatican. Pope Benedict xvi kissing an imam from Egypt. The Vatican has demanded that Benetton pull the ad. The Vatican said this was an unacceptable use of the holy father's image.”

The photos are not genuine, and in response to the criticism, the company pulled the ad about an hour after it went up.

Still, founder Alessandro Benetton explained that the new campaign is considered as "constructive provocation" and is intended "to give widespread visibility to an ideal notion of tolerance."

If it’s provocation they were after, they accomplished their goal. But was it to foster love worldwide or build their brand? A writer for Racked says, Benetton is back to it’s old standby.

“25 years ago, the then-edgy United Colors of Benetton multiracial ad campaign catapulted the brand into the big time. Now, seeing sales slump and other similar chains like H&Mand Topshop dominate, Benetton is returning to its best asset--controversy.”

New York Magazine concedes the move is probably more business than anything, but says hey- it can still be fun.

“[Benetton has] decided, apparently, that the answer to their woes is to target that most rarely targeted of demographics: international-relations dorks who love the absurd. … this Barack Obama-Hugo Chavez pairing is fun: Sometimes passionate disgust is just passion in disguise. First there was a handshake, a too-brief, but oh-so-memorable joining of flesh, a frisson of fingers and feelings. And now, at long last, this.”

But the Italian media isn’t laughing. Altre News notes, Benetton is using upsetting imagery with figures whose followers may not be so understanding.

“...after the jokes made about Muhammad in Denmark and in Norway, after the attack to the French magazine Charlie Hebdo, Benetton risks by exposing Italy to integralist attacks without any valid reason.”

The ads have been rejected by a number of publications including the International Herald Tribune, The Guardian and Elle Francia. But they will be on display in The Economist, New York Magazine, Newsweek, Monocle, Le Monde's M magazine in France, and Germany's Fur Sie and Suddeutsche Zeitung magazines.