Two pigs walk into a bar ...
No, wait. Let me start again. I can never tell a joke.
Two chicks walk into a bar. And it is full of pigs.
That's the premise of a new advertising campaign for Trojan condoms.
The bar is full of cell-phone-flipping, beer-sipping, animatronic pigs. And they are trying to sidle up to the beautiful chicks, neither of whom will give them the time of day.
Then one of the pigs saunters into the men's room, presses the lever on a Trojan dispenser, collects his condom and, miraculously, turns into a hot guy (albeit one wearing an unfortunate shirt.)
Suddenly, a chick at the bar is all smiles and eye contact.
"Evolve," is the commercial's tag line. "Use a condom every time."
If you want to see this striking, and controversial, commercial, you will have to visit YouTube .com or the corporate Web site, trojanevolve.com.
That's because the CBS and Fox networks have refused to air it and, though NBC and ABC have approved the ad, the companies' Baltimore affiliates are disinclined to run it, even in the middle of the night.
WMAR, the local ABC station, would charge an extraordinary premium - perhaps five times the going rate - to run it only between midnight and 1:30 a.m. and would pull it at the first viewer complaint, said Bill Hooper, the general manager at Channel 2.
"We are a pretty conservative company," said Hooper. "In my view, the guy is looking to get some action. It's not appropriate ... and it paints the female in a very poor way, too."
WJZ (Channel 13), owned by CBS, one of the networks that has refused the ad, said through creative director Donna Bertling, "As with any advertiser, we review commercials on a case-by-case basis before deciding to accept their advertising."
Even after viewing the ad on the Trojan Web site, Bertling declined to comment further.
WBAL, the local NBC affiliate owned by the Hearst-Argyle Corp., would also be disinclined to air the ad, said Wanda Draper, director of programming at Channel 11.
"We do accept condom ads but only when they are health related. There is no health-related issue here. It is just social," said Draper.
"Not appropriate" and "not health-related."
Those are the official objections to the Trojan ad.
Networks that make millions airing all sorts of casual sexual encounters in daytime and prime-time programming find it inappropriate to air a commercial that advocates sexual responsibility.
Television stations that broadcast those laughable Viagra and Cialis ads with numbing frequency find it inappropriate to suggest that anyone younger than the age of 60 might be having sex.
(Ask your kids which they think is more inappropriate, old people having sex or young, beautiful people having sex.)
And, at a time when only one in four sexual acts includes the use of a condom, and when an estimated 400 million people worldwide have contracted a sexually transmitted disease and when half of all pregnancies are unwanted, network executives and broadcasters fail to see anything "health-related" in this ad.
Give me a break.
"Trojan made a serious effort to address this issue," said Bill Albert, co-director of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, who met with the Trojan people before the ad was released and was impressed.
"And that [issue] is too many people are having sex and too few are using condoms."
As we have learned during two decades of trying to reduce teenage pregnancy and abortion and the rates of sexually transmitted diseases, Albert said, it takes a lot more than a flashy commercial to move the needle on social behavior.
There is no doubt that Madison Avenue is one of the players in this game and, considering the sexual content of most ad campaigns, it is nice to have its creative people on the right side for a change.
"When you are trying to get the attention of guys, the Miss Manners approach doesn't always work. Getting turned down [by the women in the commercial] might get their attention," Albert said. "Trojan has ratcheted up the profile of this issue and, in our view, that's a good thing."
What is interesting here is a ironic convergence of goals - Trojan's and mine.
The company has said in public statements that it is unlikely to significantly increase its substantial share of the U.S. condom market, which stands at about 75 percent of the $416 million spent each year. The company's answer is to increase the size of that market by recruiting women, who now make only about 30 percent of the condom purchases, but who, frankly, have the most at stake here. They are the ones who can get pregnant, and women are more likely to contract a sexually transmitted disease than their male partner.
It is thought that this ad, which portrays women as both beautiful and discerning, might do that. That's why Trojan is running print versions of the ad in Glamour and Cosmopolitan.
Funny. Because I was thinking as I watched the commercial - and here's the real joke - "Honey, with all the pigs out there, shouldn't you be carrying the condoms?"
susan.reimer@baltsun.com