[Update: complaints dismissed following appeal to independent reviewer]

Complaints against Rivers '10 deadly deals' catalogue cover have been upheld by the Advertising Standard Board.

Collective Shout had exposed Rivers eroticisation of violence against women last month after supporters found the catalogue included with their local newspaper.

Our supporters began writing to Rivers  and to the ASB to voice their objection to the use of violence against women as a marketing tool.

From Melinda Tankard Reist's blog

The Age has covered our protest against Rivers for appropriating the image of a dead woman in fishnet stockings and stilettos on the front of a catalogue headed "10 deadly deals" as described on the Collective Shout website and here. I was amused to see River's spokesman describe our interpretation of the catalogue cover as "weird and draconian".

So if we weren't meant to interpret the woman as being dead - murdered even - why the heading "10 deadly deals"? Is she merely under the couch searching for her missing purse? The damn remote? Or playing hide-and-seek badly? If she tripped and fell wouldn't the heading be '10 clumsy deals'? If we've got it so wrong, why doesn't Rivers tell us what they meant to convey with the image and wording?

Here's Michelle Griffin's piece which also mentions some of our other actions against eroticised violence against women in advertising. We can't be blasé about this trivialisation of violence against women.

Rivers uses 'dead' women to sell clothing

We were recently alerted to the front page of River's latest catalogue, '10 deadly deals.' We have previously written about Rivers' objectification of women here. It seems River's have decided that even 'dead' women are to be objectified and used to sell products.

A Collective Shout supporter was recently in a mall teeming with children and Christmas shoppers when she was confronted by Hustler T-shirts hanging at the entrance of a Krank Clothing store.

According to the Krank website, the company claims to be “Australias largest motox and lifestyle store”. It's a place where adults and young people would go for all their motor sport gear. They have clothing divisions for men, women, girls and children.

But Krank doesn't just cater for motor sports. It is also a distributor of pornographic apparel, stocking the Hustler brand.

From Melinda Tankard Reist's blog

On December 10, I wrote an opinion piece titled ‘Who says female corpses aren’t sexy?’ for ABC The Drum Unleashed, reprinted here the same day. The piece has so far received 1086 comments (many helpfully informing me I am mentally ill and hung up about sex).

Here’s an extract from the article:

T-shirt depicts bound, gagged woman splattered with blood and the words 'Relax, it's Just Sex'

Collective Shout Toowoomba member Mark McErvale recently posted an article on Collective Shout's Facebook page about these shirts - the product of US pornographic magazine 'Hustler' -  being sold by a retailer in a Kmart Plaza in Mt Isa.

Collective Shout speaks out against billboards depicting violence against women and gets results

Collective Shout supporter Patrice had posted a message about this billboard on our community page. We followed that up with a blog post encouraging other supporters to take action by writing to the Advertising Standards Board. The Advertising Standards Board have upheld complaints against Calvin Klein billboards in Sydney and Melbourne. Thanks to all who made their voices heard on this issue. As reported by the Herald Sun:

*Trigger warning for survivors of sexual assault* Recently, Patrice blogged on our community page about a Calvin Klein advertisement in Sydney's Kings Cross. Patrice said she has noticed advertisements before that were offensive, but this one motivated her to action. We can see why. A giant billboard overlooking Kings Cross features this image.