Campaign group Fathers4Justice [2] have had an advert banned by the advertising watchdog ASA after the authority received 10 complaints that the advert was misleading and based on claims that could not be substantiated.

The advert, which ran with the headline "Say in with hate this Mother's Day" next to a photo of a toddler covered in insults in March this year, was addressed to companies that advertise on the online parents' forum Mumsnet. The advert accuses Mumsnet of labelling men as "rapists", "paedophiles" and "wifebeaters". Fathers4Justice contended that these labels are offensive anti-male content that could promote hatred aganist men and boys, a prejudice as offensive "as racism and homophobia".

The campaign group has refused to accept the accusations put against them by the ASA and argue that their advert did in no way exaggerate the gravity of the situation, using screenshots from the Mumsnet website to defend their claims.

The ASA have assured that they have contacted Mumsnet, who have reiterated their intolerance of "any kind of intolerance on the site" and concluded that the advert did indeed breach the code as it was misleading of Fathers4Justice to imply that Mumsnet themselves had endorsed comments made on their forum.