Screenshot of the Yasmin advertisment

A TV commercial in China for Yasmin, a contraceptive brand under German drug maker Bayer, was deemed controversial and removed from the air after suffering backlash from Chinese audiences, who criticized it for being sexist and prejudice.

The commercial was removed on June 12 after being live for only one hour, a staffer with Bayer China helpline told the Global Times on Wednesday.

The commercial reportedly showed a man and two women sitting at a table, with the younger, more beautiful woman, embodied by a smartphone in this ad, asking the other woman, "I can tell him (the man) funny stories and play mobile games, can you?"

In response, the other woman, who is the man's wife, puts a box of contraceptive pills on the table and affirms, "I can take this, can you?" In her remarks, she implies that she wins the "battle" with the younger woman because she can have sex with the man.

The commercial seemed to have offended many viewers, especially those who are women, as many of them criticized the ad on social media, saying that it stigmatizes women.

"Let me get this straight. Did this ad just tell women that they should use sex to win back their husband's love? If so, it is disgusting," one user wrote on Weibo.

"The ad's meaning was that the biggest advantage of being a wife is that she can have sex without condoms," wrote another. "It makes me confused as to why it makes such an awkward comparsion between a woman and an object."

Some angry users flooded Bayer's Weibo account, asking the company for an official apology. In a media statment, Bayer later said that it had dealt with the commercial, and that it respects the rights of all females to use contraception.

Feminist Chen Yaya, a research fellow at Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said the ad clearly displayed sexual discrimination against both men and women. 

"Women use contraceptives to avoid pregnancy," Chen said. "They do not use contraceptives to please men with 'better sexual expereinces,' and they should not be regarded as a tool to achieve men's favor," she told the Global Times on Wednesday.

In addition, the ad offended males by discribing the husband as a sexual-impulse-obeying animal, Chen added.

In fact, the commercial may have violated advertisement law, according to legal experts. 

"It could have violated China's Advertisment Law, which requires that commercials not contain 'matters that disrupt public order or violate social customs,'" lawyer Zhang Bo told the Global Times on Wednesday, adding that the company could be punished if the appropriate law enforcement bodies define it as illegal.

Regardless, the ad's controversial content is more of a moral issue, rather than a legal one, Zhang said.