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An Alberta pro-oil sands group is apologizing for a controversial advertisement that’s received heavy criticism.
“In Canada lesbians are considered hot. In Saudia Arabia if you’re a lesbian you die!” reads the ad posted by the Canada Oil Sands Community Facebook group, next to a photo of two women kissing.
“Why are we getting our oil from countries that don’t think lesbians are hot?!”
The image concludes with the phrase “Choose Equality! Choose Canadian oil!” inside an arrow that points to one woman’s buttocks. It was posted with the hashtag #lesbiansarehot.
The post had been shared more than 1,000 times on Facebook by Monday afternoon and garnered dozens of incensed comments, with people lambasting the ad as repulsive and misogynistic.
Comments on the group’s Facebook page were almost entirely negative.
“I am a person, not a piece of pornography to be applied to whatever marketing BS you’ve come up with,” one woman wrote.
Dr. Kris Wells, faculty director with the University of Alberta’s Institute for Sexual Minority Studies and Services, said the ad should be taken down, calling it offensive, sexist and inappropriate.
“First of all it objectifies women. Secondly, it uses lesbian women as some kind of male heterosexual fetish or fantasy,” Wells said. “It completely delegitimizes the entire point that organization is trying to make about standing up for human rights abuses in countries that Canada does trading with.”
Canada Oil Sands Community founder Robbie Picard posted any apology on the group’s Facebook page which includes “It was not my intent of demeaning women or any people of any sexual orientation.”
Agencies/Canadajournal
