There have been a few examples of ridiculous, insensitive or just plain stupid online advertising targeting by the likes of Google and Facebook. For example, I read something recently by a woman who changed her Facebook relationship status to single and was immediately assaulted by adverts trying to sell her “psychological secrets” and “mind games” to help her win back her man.

Here’s my addition to the canon. I just finished reading an article on the Guardian website in which Misha Glenny takes issue with Chris Grayling’s references to “Baltimore upon Thames”. The gist being the reprehensible way the politician is playing up to public perceptions of violent crime through TV series (in this case, The Wire) in order to fear-monger and score political points. The truth is that UK violent crime figures don’t warrant this kind of hysteria, and in fact are not even on the increase. Add to this the inappropriate use of The Wire to illustrate the point. According to Glenny the “unambiguous” message of The Wire is that “the war on drugs is what fosters violence and gangs in west Baltimore”. So it’s precisely the hysteria about crime, and the inept and opportunistic way this is used by politicians and law enforcement, that end up encouraging and building on the problem.

And at the end of the article, the cack-handed Google ad placement engine saw fit to place these three adverts:

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