The Advertising Standards Authority has received nearly 200 complaints about the Heinz mayonnaise ad, which - assuming a higher final tally - should make it one of the five most offensive this year. Let me describe the controversial sales pitch. There are some kids, with a mum in a white apron, and a dad, but - ah ha! - when the dad goes to leave, it turns out the mum isn't a mum, she's a bloke from a New York deli. The dad gives the him-not-her a kiss goodbye. Smack on the lips, like some kind of gay, except it has nothing to do with being gay - it is a joke about the mayonnaise being so authentic it's as if your mum has turned into a bloke from a New York deli.

Complaints have centred on the fact that one man kissing another could be construed as homosexuality, and oblige parents to explain to children what that is. Never mind that mayonnaise can't be advertised between kids' programmes because the fat and salt content is too high. So it doesn't matter that the product is so injurious to health that the mere mention of it is thought too toxic for pre-watershed telly; and it doesn't matter that both the stated and tacit messages of the advert are nothing to do with sexuality of any sort, it's a straight "mayonnaise is nice" underpinned by the British-ad fascination with men dressed as women revealed as men (think Bounty - wipe not bar).

I don't mind the existence of the odd humourless homophobe, but I'm interested by their sense of entitlement, considering what a marginal view they hold. They look around, see anti-discrimination legislation all about, see a gay wedding officiated by an actual bishop, and still think the ASA will be on their side.

It never occurs to me to lodge a complaint with the ASA and this is categorically not because I'm never offended. I'm constantly offended. I hate the preponderance of alternative indie music on the ad circuit, so that everything from a Samsung camera to a Toyota people carrier or an Orange chat plan is flogged with the voice of some sub-Joanna Newsome no mark. Not only is it cynical, this pretence that buying a big square car is the "alternative" choice, but it appropriates and tramples over the aural landscape of the outsider so that there's nowhere for even an outsider to feel at home. It's disgraceful; a genuine traducement of the purpose of art, which is to make us feel that we're not alone.

On feminist grounds, I object to the Corsodyl advert; a camera travels pervily over the body of a young woman, lingering on her thighs, arse and breasts, before coming to a stop at her mouth, where she's missing a tooth because of her poor oral hygiene. I guess it's meant to be funny, though it's hard to pin it down - is it a take-off of sexist 70s ads? I don't think it's even that self-aware. I think it's an old-fashioned reversal-of-expectation gag. "Ah! The shock! Her breasts were so promising, and yet she has a mouth like a graveyard. While we've got your horrified attention, ladies, might we suggest this mouthwash?" What a nauseating comic backwater. Who would want to explain to their daughter why this kind of thing would never happen to a boy?

Ok, I am rustling up a bit of this outrage. I have to admit that Corsodyl does work, and my mouth would be an emptier place without it. But my objections would have no greater trouble - considerably less, I think - gathering adherents than would those of people who don't like the kissing men. Why don't lefties complain more? First, we assume watchdog bodies such as the ASA will be on the side of a very old-fashioned respectability, despite all evidence that mainstream culture is more evolved than that. Second, we are lazy bleeders. When an ad featuring men kissing is one of the most complained about, that matters: not as a reflection on the nation's scattered homophobes breathing their last gasp, but as a sign that the rest of us don't complain anything like enough.

mszoewilliams@yahoo.co.uk