Nivea wins most racist ad for 2017

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A lot of South East Asian countries tend to associate whiter with prettier.
 
I doubt they realized it. It certainly doesn't make it ok, it makes it tone deaf. Why would a huge company do anything that could cause a controversy and potentially hurt their bottom line, it just doesn't make sense that the immediate assumption is some racist saw this and said "yes this supports my views, forget what all our internal meetings say, push it through.

They need to hire a new ad company because anyone who could let this stuff slip through is horrible at their job. It makes them stupid, not malicious.

ad agency that is paid multi millions and staff 6-figure employees know exactly what they are producing for the market they are advertising to.

it is advertising. not filmmaking.

they aren't artists. their #1 goal is to sell a product.
 
Wow.

Seriously, I get what they were trying to do, but god Damm, in this day and age, how can you not see that it will absolutely be interpreted like this? It's absurd!
 
what's the threshold for being "too sensitive"? I'm taking a survey

It's a pretty harmless ad at face value, but the subtle imprinting as it alludes to race is something that you learn in MKT, PSY, or SOC 101. Why is this being debated in the thread?
 
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A lot of South East Asian countries tend to associate whiter with prettier.

Yeah people in here are getting their arms up over something that is as common as tanning cream in many Asian countries. Go to a supermarket in SE Asia and you will find the shelves lined with skin whitening cream.

People who live in lighter skinned cultures often find people with dark skin to be attractive just like some people can find lighter skin to be attractive.

The purity part of that ad is fucked up though.
 
I'm not sure what's wrong with this, is it something in the text? The resolution is too small to see it.

Edit: nvm, I originally thought his hair was overgrown, but it just looks like a normal afro.
 
Sometimes, looking back. Gaf fucking sucks. Like extremely so.

Then I see the rest of the Internet and end up reconciling.

Neogaf OT is a different place than it was in 2011. That whole thread is chalk full of alt-right sentiment, I dont see that much around here anymore. Thats due to some proactive perma-bans or people just being too intimidated to post like that anymore.
 
Skin lightening is big in a lot of asian countries. The idea of dark skin is associated with outdoor workers and being poor. There's people who walk around with umbrellas to avoid the sun and of course all these lightening creams etc.
 

I think it's harmless

sure you can go into race issues if you love confrontation and arguing what ifs

but I don't think that's what the ad is for

I mean if this guy went to a job interview at an accounting firm

with the same qualifications who would get the job 1. puffball head vs 2. clean cut
 
Neogaf OT is a different place than it was in 2011. That whole thread is chalk full of alt-right sentiment, I dont see that much around here anymore. Thats due to some proactive perma-bans or people just being too intimidated to post like that anymore.

yeah, gamergate had a nice side affect of slaughtering dirtbag alt-righters on here. I was a long-time lurker before getting on board here as a member but that fiasco destroyed many shitbags.
 
I think it's harmless

sure you can go into race issues if you love confrontation and arguing what ifs

but I don't think that's what the ad is for

I mean if this guy went to a job interview at an accounting firm

with the same qualifications who would get the job 1. puffball head vs 2. clean cut

It perpetuates the stereotype that natural African-american hair is "uncivilized". Marketing is all about optics and perception, and from this regard the ad fails miserably. That's not to say the ad-makers were virulent racists, but at best they are extraordinarily tone-deaf.
 
I think it's harmless

sure you can go into race issues if you love confrontation and arguing what ifs

but I don't think that's what the ad is for

I mean if this guy went to a job interview at an accounting firm

with the same qualifications who would get the job 1. puffball head vs 2. clean cut

I showed this add to 3 ultra conservatives at my job, all of them were speechless, I also showed it to an immigrant who said many times that he doesn't "get" american race issues, he refused to believe anyone was dumb enough to put that out. I don't see how you call an add for a black man to become "re-civilized" not racist.
 
I showed this add to 3 ultra conservatives at my job, all of them were speechless, I also showed it to an immigrant who said many times that he doesn't "get" american race issues, he refused to believe anyone was dumb enough to put that out. I don't see how you can all an add for a black man to become "re-civilized" not racist.

ignorance and lack of empathy probably.
 
I think it's harmless

sure you can go into race issues if you love confrontation and arguing what ifs

but I don't think that's what the ad is for

I mean if this guy went to a job interview at an accounting firm

with the same qualifications who would get the job 1. puffball head vs 2. clean cut

That you think natural hair is problematic says a lot about you. That's not harmless.
 
I'll play devil's advocate.

You could make the argument that many people may not even conceive that the ad targets a specific group.

I can see someone blankly accepting the message at face value and then being legitimately surprised by the disguised intention being revealed to them.
 
"White is purity" sounds like a Ku Klux Klan slogan.

It's fine to think white skin is prettier but saying that having white skin makes someone pure is crossing the line into white supremacy.
 
well, yeah i mean white is typically associated with purity, it's the universal symbol for purity.
I have no idea what the ad is trying to say though
 
That's a myth. The reason was that it signaled wealth. It was a past equivalent of lighting hundred dollar bills on fire today.
It's not a myth. The point of signaling wealth is one of the reasons behind it but not the only or the biggest one.

They started to wear white dresses to also show purity and the fact that they are marrying as a virgin. For some time there was also some strange behaviour in the higher nobility circles: right after marriage the bridal pair was supposed to have sex and the bride was supposed to reappear in her white dress with blood stains to prove that she was a virgin before.

well, yeah i mean white is typically associated with purity, it's the universal symbol for purity.
I have no idea what the ad is trying to say though
Nivea is a german brand and their original slogan is translated to something between "clear skin" and "pure skin". Not sure which one would be more fitting. Guess they tried to translate it and somehow messed it up a bit.
 
There's a really interesting, short documentary about the fair skin sensation in India:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT7x1BIEhY0 - "Fair? A documentary about skin colour in India"

Basically, everyone is into this shit and it's a huge industry there.

Check out the ridiculous Fair & Lovely commercial at 11:23

I've lived there for most of my life before moving abroad, it's sad but true. People (both men and women) with darker skin are generally looked down upon and thought of as 'less clean' or less privileged etc etc.
 
I'll play devil's advocate.

You could make the argument that many people may not even conceive that the ad targets a specific group.

I can see someone blankly accepting the message at face value and then being legitimately surprised by the disguised intention being revealed to them.

The bolded is a big part of the problem too.
 
A lot of people just don't see "racism" unless it's a redneck in a white Klan hat waving a confederate flag yelling for the lynching of blacks.

Like, the standard is so high for "real racism". It's dumb, and you know why? Because this overt, super obvious, self evident racism is not the real reason why racism is bad. The lone white-purity nutter isn't going to do jack shit in the grand scheme of things.

It's the subtle, low key, racism that people overlook all the time that is really harmful, because it's the kind of thing that keeps you from being employed in certain jobs, from advancing in social circles, that poisons the minds children who grow up to resent minorities. This is what's known as "institutional racism", where bigotry and prejudice is baked into society in such a way that most people don't even know it's there.

This ad isn't bad just because of "white is purity" hurr durr nazi aryan supremcism, although that's pretty bad in and of itself.

It's bad because no one looked at it and thought "doesn't this seem kind of nazi?". It's not the message that offends, but the tone deafness.
 
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