Friday, December 18, 2009

Photo Shop vs Truth in Advertising

At least in England the air brush forces are being rebuffed -- by an act of Parliament, no less. But the tipping point wasn't about news "photographs" manipulated to promote a particular bias regarding the Iraqi war or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; rather it is a reaction against a beauty company's distorting reality in order to sell cold cream.

It was Olay's retouching photographs of Twiggy last summer that brought the issue to British lawmakers. At 59, the former super model still looks fantastic but skeptics nevertheless concluded that her photos in the Definity eye cream ads were just a bit too free of crow's feet, wrinkles and under-eye bags to be real.

They were right. The pics had been doctored. And now they've actually been banned by the U.K's Advertising Standards Authority.

Commercials being required to tell the truth? I'm all for it. Now if we could only move that into politics, lawyer-speak and news coverage.