The Advertising Standards Authority has ruled that a Reebok TV ad featuring 50 Cent should be banned because of its violent content. As previously reported, the ad showed Fiddy counting the nine times he has been shot, and then laughing as an off camera voice asked him who he planned to "massacre" next. The ASA said that the advert "endorsed his type of lifestyle and disregarded the unsavoury and perilous aspects of it by implying it was possible to survive being shot nine times".
The decision was welcomed by Mothers Against Guns founder Lucy Cope, whose son Damian was shot dead outside a nightclub in Holborn in 2002, who said "As a victim and a campaigner, I thank them from the bottom of my heart. They don't realise it but they have saved lives."
In any case, Reebok withdrew the ad at the start of last month, pulling it on 8 April saying that "a small number" of people "misinterpreted it and found it offensive". They defended the series of adverts, which featured such celebrities as Lucy Liu and Kelly Holmes, as they were intended as "positive and empowering celebration of the right of freedom of self-expression, individuality and authenticity"