The cure is the cause

Have you watched the heartburn remedy adverts on (South African) TV with the morphing firemen? There’s one version where a pregnant woman, who appears to be in some discomfort, is asking an equally pregnant pharmacist for something to relieve heartburn.

After expounding the merits of the featured remedy for some time to the suffering woman, including how safe it is to use during pregancy, the pharmacist finally produces a bottle of the stuff. The stoic customer, who seems on the verge of collapse at any second, then gratefully swallows a spoonful of it.

The scene cuts to somewhere inside of her, where a little white fireman is hard at it with his hose, spraying her innards with the miraculous white liquid, while his buddies stand by to assist...

Could neither of these women figure out that having little white guys ferretting around inside them with their hoses is probably what led to the whole damn mess in the first place?

The final, ‘seminal’ image in the ad is of the (presumably sated) fireman waving his oversized hose at a suggestive angle, as a large drop of white liquid exudes from it in a distinctly biological way – quite different from what one would expect from a high pressure firehose.

Having penned these weighty thoughts, I wondered if it was just me, or did anyone else read this ad the way I did. After Googling the name of the remedy together with the word ‘fireman’ I was relieved to find that I’m not alone – though disappointed not to be quite as ahead of the curve as I first imagined. Other ads featuring the lucky lads are the subject of these articles, but the gist remains the same.

Verdict – either the copywriter urgently needs to get laid before his/her next brief, or is a genius of Freudian proportions.