#5 Crossing the Line

Racism in Advertising


There are hundreds of sites out there that discuss racism in advertising. I find it very interesting to see all of the different points of view. Everyone sees these ads differently. To one person looking at an ad, it might seem fine, but to another, it might scream racist. I decided to check out a few websites and videos and make up my own mind. Racist or not? Some of the advertisements I had seen before and didn't really pick up on the racism until viewing them for this assignment. 


The first website I visited was Ad Savvy. They have an article called the 25 Most Racist Advertisements and Commericals. I looked through them and picked the ones I thought were the most racist. Check them out:

Usually the ads that are labeled racist, show sexism between men and women, or racism of African Americans. I thought this ad was interesting because it is something I rarely see. It is not often that a company thinks it is okay to show terrorism in a comical commercial. No wonder it was banned. And I have to say, that as a person with friends from the Middle East area, I completely understand why this advertisement is wrong and hurtful. 

I thought this next ad was pretty funny. It is a political advertisement insulting the opposing candidate. The ad is promoting a white man for the office and the opposing is an African American man. By showing the hands of a man opening a letter, it is clear that a African American man was hired over a white man, not because of the right qualifications, but because of the racial quota law. The ad ends by basically saying vote for Jesse Helms because he is against racial quotas. It makes me wonder who won. Let's hope it was not Helms who blatantly confessed to being racist!

Sony ran an ad in the Netherlands for a new ceramic white PSP. To me this one is so clearly racist that it makes me wonder how anyone thought it was okay to run the ad in the first place. The ad shows a strong, mean-looking white woman dominating a black woman by grabbing her jaw. Sony pulled the ads after a lot of racist buzz and apologized for the lack of sensitivity. 

This next ad is an ad that ran in Asia. Apparently the ad was supposed to show how appearances can be deceiving. Did it work? I don't know. I, like many others, was just left confused. A black man starts as a good samaritan and ends up turning into black toothpaste? I guess in a way I understand the point of the message, but how this very strange commercial is supposed to promote the toothpaste, I will never know. I wonder if their sales went up! 

I have dubbed this print ad the most racist ad I have ever seen.

I found this print ad on EgoTV, and all I can really say is "WOW!" I started reading it and I thought, "Okay, I guess it is a nice effort to promote equality." Then I got to the end. "...black or yellow or brown or normal." What is normal? Obviously in this context 'normal' means white. This might be one of the most racist ads I have ever seen. It is kind of an oxymoron; an ad to promote equality telling everyone that to be white is normal. Wow.