Brands are really struggling in this uber touchy world of ours, aren’t they? Particularly when it comes to the simple issue of rape. Earlier this month saw Bloomingdale’s telling us to spike our best friend’s drink. Now, an online fashion retailer has dug itself into a very deep hole. This is what’s known in the biz as A Bad Idea.

This SuperGurl advert reads “Rape us now”, next to a teenage girl. The ad went up on the Singapore-based site to promote its Black Friday sale. Of course, the highly weird advert was taken down and branded “inappropriate” and “disgusting” by various people on social media.

“How could you put something like this? Rape is not an appropriate synonym to shop now, especially when your target market is young women and tweens,” wrote Ethan Wang on Facebook. 

The company’s response? The brand’s creative director, Jordus Lim, posted an apology saying SuperGurl “did not mean it to be offensive to anyone”. Mr Lim said he’d failed to review the work before approving the image and admitted they had “made a mistakes” which was “insensitive” and “indefensible”. The apology continues: “I hereby acknowledge that we have made a mistake, and that our caption does not advocate the right values to the young women community today.”

How do things like this get through? It sounds like lad banter circa 2009 but that’s presumably the idea. A thought for advertisers – just avoid sexual assault in your ad campaigns. Just avoid the whole topic completely and you’re probably safe. P.S. Proofreading.