Meat and Livestock Australia Advertisement

The Hon. J.S. LEE (15:29): Today, I am compelled to rise and speak about the controversial advertisement by Meat and Livestock Australia, which is causing grief and anger among many multicultural religious groups, particularly the Hindu community. As a member of this parliament, with a proud multicultural background, I am grateful that many Indian community leaders have reached out to me to raise concerns about the highly offensive nature of the ad, either expressed or implied, in the latest media campaign by Meat and Livestock Australia.

On 4 September 2017, Meat and Livestock Australia released its latest marketing campaign to position lamb as the meat more people can eat, regardless of their religious beliefs. The video ad portrays gods, goddesses, divinities and prophets of different faiths and beliefs coming together to share lamb at a barbecue. The ad caused great offence to many, particularly the Australian Hindu community, because of its depiction of the Hindu god, Lord Ganesha, a vegetarian, sitting at a table with meat being served and raising a glass with the words, 'To lamb: the meat we can all eat.'

In addition, Lord Ganesha was addressed as the elephant in the room, which is a most hurtful thing for the Hindu community to watch because in the video Lord Ganesha is laughed at in a mocking tone by the other guests. Buddha and goddess Guan Yin are featured in the ad as well. Buddhists, as we all know, are also vegetarian, so they are offended. They find the ad to be totally disrespectful and highly inappropriate.

Honourable members will know that the recent ABS census revealed Australia as a fast-changing, ever-expanding, culturally diverse nation. Australia is a proud multicultural and multifaith country and everyone should be treated with empathy and respect. I have been an Aussie for 37 years now, and I get it that many Australians love their lamb. I also get it that Australians are renowned for their quirky sense of humour. However, as a nation that embraces diversity, we do not want our humour to offend or cause distrust within the multicultural society that we live in.

So, why would an organisation like Meat and Livestock Australia attempt to gain commercial advantage by mocking every religion in this country? What are they thinking? I believe Meat and Livestock Australia has totally missed the mark. Their creative energy has gone mad and has gone too far. This bad sense of humour is not uniting people. It is highly controversial and sends the wrong message.

Last week, the India Forum Australia and many Hindu community groups organised Stand for Ganesha, a nationwide peaceful protest across five cities in Australia. South Australian members of the Indian community gathered at Adelaide's Hindmarsh Square with large posters to demonstrate their strong objection to the ad and call on Meat and Livestock to remove the misleading and insensitive ad. The Advertising Standards Bureau, the advertising watchdog, received more than 20 complaints on the day that the ad went on air, and no doubt more complaints have been made since.

The High Commission of India lodged a formal complaint and urged Meat and Livestock Australia to withdraw the ad. There are over 100 news articles and thousands of social media postings that have been published online regarding the ad. In addition to the Hindu Council of Australia, other religious institutions, including the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, Anglican Church, Greek Orthodox Christian parish, Buddhist associations and other religious groups have denounced the media ad.

If Meat and Livestock Australia want to bring everyone together, no matter their religious faith, they are definitely going about it the wrong way. To restore goodwill, they should apologise to the Australian-Indian Hindu community and other religious groups and also ban the offensive ad and start afresh. I hope the independent advertising watchdog will also take appropriate action and prevent this type of controversial ad from ever appearing on our TV and social media screens again.

Today, in parliament, I joined the South Australian-Indian and Hindu community and other religious groups to strongly condemn the Meat and Livestock advertisement as poorly conceived, hurtful, insensitive and misleading. Let us stop an ad that could be harmful to our multicultural brand, and let us stop an ad that could be damaging to our diplomatic and trade relations with India and other countries. Let us support the Indian Hindu community in addressing this important issue, particularly when the Indian Diwali festival is just around the corner. We want to celebrate Diwali and all the wonderful things that a harmonious multifaith and multicultural society brings to Australia.