Danish Tourism Ad "Offends" Some
VisitDenmark pulls "offensive" tourism ad
![VisitDenmark pulls "offensive" tourism ad](http://www.eturbonews.com/files/imagecache/fullpage/000rr_136.jpg "VisitDenmark pulls "offensive" tourism ad")
COPENHAGEN — Denmark's tourism agency has removed an advertisement from YouTube after complaints that it promoted promiscuity in the liberal Scandinavian country.
The video clip, nearly 3 minutes long, shows a young, blond woman cradling a dark-skinned infant called "August" and saying he is the result of a brief fling with a foreign tourist.
Speaking English in the video, she says she is "trying to find August's father" through YouTube. Danish TV2 has clarified that the scene was staged and the woman is an actress.
Since being posted Thursday by VisitDenmark, the ad received more than 800,000 hits on YouTube. VisitDenmark removed the clip Monday, but it can be still viewed as it has been copied and posted elsewhere on the Internet.
Sociologist Karen Sjoerup said the ad suggested "you can lure fast, blonde Danish women home without a condom."
Economy Minister Lene Espersen said the video presented "a not very well-thought-out picture of the country." Espersen also holds the government's tourism portfolio.
"I regret that the film has offended so many people," VisitDenmark manager Dorte Kiilerich said, explaining that intent had been to tell "a nice and sweet story about a grown-up woman who lives in a free society and accepts the consequences of her actions."
On the Net: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-SSHxGGpjM
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