Holiday Ad Has Hidden Hate Message

NBC 5 ^ | December 11, 2003

[yonif]

DALLAS -- A holiday shopping flier that's been distributed to thousands of households in north Texas is creating controversy because a message of hate is included within an advertisement.

An ad for "Party City" was supposed to highlight a sale on Hanukkah items, but it also contained a hateful anti-Semitic message.

The advertisement includes the sentence "CC Hates the Jews" in large, bold letters.

According to ADVO, the company that printed the advertisement, a graphic artist working on the ad had left his desk for a moment, and a co-worker with the initials C.C. changed the text on the ad.

The graphic artist didn't notice the change and the ad went to print.

However, despite the explanation, the Anti-Defamation League wants more questions answered.

"How did it get out of the graphic shop in Pittsburgh? How did it get by ADVO? How did it get by the printer and all of that?" Mark Briskman said.

ADVO representatives in Dallas said they are mortified by the oversight and that they are trying to figure out why the error was never caught.

[stands2reason]

Hidden, blatant, same difference... ;-)

[jwalburg]

LOL, Still, "Some kinda headline" does seem slightly better than "Sing a ling a ding dong," if I do say so.
Our paper got in trouble once for a story on a city commission candidate who murdered his homosexual lover before the election. It was a shock to the whole small, conservative community by itself, but when the headline accidently included the word "homocide" it was even worse.

[DallasMike]

You have a lot of Christian friends in Texas.

Amen to that! If anyone comes for the Jews in Dallas they're going to have to get through me and a bunch of other Christians first.

[radiohead]

What is that, about 32 point sans bold? And the copy editor missed it?

LOL! I've been working w/powerpoint most of today. I can hardly see from playing with font styles and sizes. There is no way someone missed this. Especially someone getting paid for making an ad or editing.

[JRandomFreeper]

the Texas law is in violation of The First Amendment.

Has it been ajudicated? The Criminal Access to Computing Devices (or whatever it is called) looked pretty air-tight when they passed it and in prosecutions afterwards.

/john

[Coleus]

That's some BIG mistake, looks like it was intentional and cc should be fired.

[TheSpottedOwl]

Did CC get fired? I would certainly hope so. How disgusting!

[JRandomFreeper]

Even in humor, Jew hating has become popular.

I wouldn't want to be on the side of a 'Red Rover'(kid's game) line that lined up against the Jewish nation. God keeps promises.

/john

[tcuoohjohn]

Another Weird event out of Texas...

Must be something in the aquifers.

[GladesGuru]

By Monday, CC will be in lots of hot water. With this amount of publicity, heads will roll for certain. Ad agencies don't like things like this to happen, and I can just imagine the CEO's mood when CC shows up. If he's dumb enough to so do.

Wouldn't you like to have TV rights to that scene, though?

[ladyinred]

It isn't like the hateful message is tiny! I suppose it is possible that people just do their routine job and pay no attention to the wording. Maybe!

[yonif]

That certainly could be a reason it got through.

[Free Trapper]

I've noticed homicide being spelled homocide on FR pretty regularly,lately and it causes a second look every time. :)

[Doohickey]

The headline says HIDDEN? Yeah, you really have to squint to see it...

[Jeff Chandler]

Anti-semitism is all the rage.

[Brad’s Gramma]

Anti-semitism is all the rage.

Not with ME it isn't!!!!!!!!

And Jeff, I know your comment was sarcastic...MINE isn't. Mine is for all the stupid lurkers out there who ARE anti-semitic.

[Jeff Chandler]

I'm astounded that hatred of the Jews has rebounded in my lifetime. All it took was for the Islamists to declare jihad on America for anti-semitism to become "cool".

[weegee]

I got one of these in Houston for Party City. It went straight from my mailbox to the trash with the other junkmail.

I know that this article says that the North Texas circulars were affected but I can't confirm or deny if "South/East" Texas also was affected.

[lentulusgracchus]

ADVO has always been a pain in the butt to me. They send out tons of trash at a favored rate that only encourages the mass-mailers to send even more trash, and then my bills get tipped into their trashwad and I have to retrieve them lest they get tossed aside with the ads.

If they get put out of business by this brouhaha, that will be just okay with me. I hope some cranky Jewish addressee hires Alan Dershowitz and sues their butts off.

[Wilhelm Tell]

I can imagine how something like this could be missed. I worked for about 10 years in the publishing business. Mistakes do happen, and if someone wants to sabotage something before it prints, it is possible. Normally, when I worked on something and walked away from my desk for a few minutes, I don't come back thinking that I have to look for signs that someone sabotaged my work while I was away. The original grapnic artist could have proofed the work, saved it, and then this "C.C." could have altered it without anyone noticing.

I am fairly surprised that no one caught the problem when the sabotaged ad was being printed. Still, it is possible that no one noticed it. One thing about the publishing and printing business, is that everything is always hurry, hurry, hurry! People are generally multi-tasking, having several "urgent" projects going on at once. It can be quite a treadmill.

I think just about every company has a policy to fire anyone caught sabotaging work. I would also think that there are civil and perhaps criminal penalties for someone sabotaging work -- C.C.'s exploit must have cost someone thousands of dollars, in addition to creating ill-will. This person does not sound like he is very bright -- sabotaging work and signing his initials! I have no doubt that if this person has legal problems because of his own actions, he will blame it all on a "Jewish conspiracy."