Australian Commercial Celebrates Diversity and Also Grilling Lamb

The commercial promotes the consumption of grilled lamb on Australia Day, and it’s been making waves in the same way so many commercials do: It’s very charming, and it contains a nice positive message no sensible person could disagree with. In the commercial, a white male Australian host is shoved aside while Bengali-Australian actor Arka Das leads the viewer on a tour through Australia’s wonderland of diversity: immigrants from all over the globe, a smattering of different religions, a pair of very handsome gay parents, some digs at recent controversies over the skin color of light-skinned aboriginal peoples. The message: Australia is diverse! But one thing everyone can agree on is that lamb is tasty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9Ka3a7cdYw

According to a study from the commercial’s makers, Meat and Livestock Australia, which is an extremely and unabashedly biased agency that exists to promote meat-eating in Australia (our Stateside equivalents would be something like the agency responsible for the Got Milk? campaigns), lamb is by far the most “patriotic” of meats. It isn’t the most popular, though; a 2013 study found that chicken and beef both far outstrip lamb in Australia.

Meat and Livestock Australia is known for its cheeky, goofy ads, some of which occasionally flare up into virality (like this one) or controversy. The latter was more noticed back in January when one lamb-promotion ad made fun of a bearded Australian expat living in Brooklyn for identifying as a vegan; hundreds complained. So why not pick “diversity” as the backdrop of your new ad? It almost dares anyone to complain.