Is that it??? When I heard about this before I assumed that it must have involved a big long French kiss or something.

I wonder how many of those "200 viewers" who complained were actually shills for Heinz. Also, since when is 200 complaints enough to make someone ax an ad? News articles like this were my inspiration for coining the phrase "faux indignation".

Seriously? Seriously.

I lean toward agreeing with Ardiril. Something smells fishy, and it ain't the mayo.

That was gay?

That ad was soooo het.

I thought it was Mandy Patinkin. He's hawt.

There's a teeny argument to be made that it's anti-female, but only just. The mom in a chef's hat is too overdone.

It seems so silly that this is a big deal. From where I'm sitting, the ad wasn't about a homosexual family or anything, it was just subbing the usual wife with the NY guy because it is NY-style mayo as a joke. I really can't see reading it any other way- and the humor is at least in part derived by the reversal of expectations of what a "normal" straight family kitchen is like- even making it a little homophobic. (like: "OMG the mum's a dude! GHEY! hahaha")

People see their pet issues wherever they go. I don't think this ad is at all about the gay aspect.

It's hard to believe that Heinz would not have known that this would get complaints, therefore, be prepared to keep running it.

It's worse now than if it had never been run at all.

I got the same thing out of it rmless2 did. To me it's completely NOT pushing "the gay agenda."

Weird that people freaked. They probably wouldn't have 20 years ago, when gay marriage wasn't on people's radar.

Also:

My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!

(Poor Mandy Patinkin for having had the misfortune to have such a fun and memorable character early in his career.)

Yeah, with just a little editing in of a real "mom" it would have been ... well, sort of hilarious.

I've been in the revenge business so long I don't know what to do with the rest of my life

Poor, nuthin' man. I've got a thing for geniuses with dark eyes and long hair and mustaches and boy can he handle a sword. </drool>

Also: "Gay"

I saw Mandy Patinkin perform at the ridiculously posh arts centre in Melbourne, it was awesome - he had the whole crowd, dripping in diamonds, up off their seats, doing the hokey-pokey in Yiddish. My life was complete when he got up at the end, and said..."allo, my name is Inigo Montoya, you kill my father, prepare to die!" But I also love Rube from Dead like me, so don't think that that was his only great character!

There was a similar incident with a children's tv show "Playschool" over here - because a little girl referred in it to "my two mummies". They complained soo much about it - though in fact the girl was referring to her mother, and STEP mother.

Even so, the whole thing is completely ridiculous, I think.

Wow, 200 complaints, huh. Let's get 200 of our gay friends and/or selves together to complain about every commercial featuring a straight kiss, and see how many get yanked off the air.

When I first heard about this I thought the fuss was over portraying gay parents as normal. But the humour in it doesn't work unless the idea of a man marrying another man is taken as being ridiculous. Ergo, Heinz suck and this is a lame stunt ad.

"It is understood that the commercial was not shown during children's television programming, because of new rules from Ofcom that restrict ads for products high in fat, salt and sugar."

Well, thank god for that!