On January 23 2020, the Facebook page “We Resist” shared the following images, purportedly a “Brazilian condom ad” mocking world leaders Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong-Il:
Text atop three images of Trump, Putin, and Kim Jong-Il trapped in condoms read, “Brasilian ad for condoms.” In under 24 hours, 20,000 Facebook users shared the meme.
The “We Resist” page did not include any citations or sources for the information other than the claim it was from Brazil. There was no apparent date on the “Brazilian condom ad” image set, and more suspiciously, no brand was benefiting from the images’ viral spread.
In June 2017, BoingBoing and the Daily Dot wrote about the previously-viral images, both pieces featuring headlines about a “condom ad.” But BoingBoing’s coverage began:
Platinum FMD created this series of spec ads featuring the tagline “some people should never have been born.”
They also show some of the concept art and prelimiary renderings, revealing the amount of work it took to achieve the look and feel.
At the end of the Daily Dot’s piece, a brief paragraph explained:
Both pictures are spec ads, meaning they weren’t created for any specific condom brand. Platinum was just showing off their image creation skills, which, in this case, seem pretty impressive.
As noted in both items, the “Brazilian condom ad” was the work of a firm called Platinum FMD. Platinum uploaded several iterations of the piece to a set titled “Some people should never have been born” on May 25 2017. The images were a creative project in the style of a condom ad.
However, the three images of Trump, Putin, and Kim Jong-Il trapped in prophylactics was not, in fact, an actual “Brazilian condom ad,” since it did not appear to have been used for any advertising purposes by any condom manufacturer. It did serve as a fairly effective advertisement for Platinum FMD — a design firm, not a condom brand.