links for 2011-08-20

By On August 20, 2011 · 5 Comments
  • Nivea's Racist Ad "Re-civilizes" a Black Man | GOOD
    Oh yeah–they fauxpologized.–AJP "Nivea must have a serious lack of diversity on their marketing team, because there is no other explanation for why an ad like this got approved. The ad (see full image here) features a preppy, groomed black man holding the head of his former self, who's sporting a beard, an afro, and a pissed-off expression. The words 'Re-civilize Yourself' are scrawled across the image, with the smaller phrase 'Look like you give a damn' on top. The message couldn't be clearer: natural hair on a black man isn't a style preference or a nod to afrocentrism—it's straight-up uncivilized."
    (tags: via:carleandriacook racism blackmen stereotypes advertising socialmedia)
  • “I Didn’t Think of Myself As Good-Looking at All” | New York Magazine
    "Her biggest break was, of course, Avedon, the man who declared her 'probably the most beautiful woman in the world.' They were friends and collaborators “from 1958 until the day he died,” in 2004. But the Machado that Avedon met had come to fashion sideways. She claims that until she was employed as one, she didn’t know what a model was and had never read a fashion magazine. She’d been raised with two brothers and a stepbrother in a culture in which girls like her were invisible. White American women—Irene Dunne, Vivien Leigh, Rita Hayworth, and Machado’s idol, Ava Gardner—were the paragons of beauty in movies and posters around Shanghai. 'We [nonwhites] had no images. We had nothing that told us we were nice-­looking. Nothing. So I didn’t think of myself as good-looking at all. It never occurred to me,' she says. In other words, she’d never seen another China Machado."
    (tags: via:carleandriacook mixedrace models fashion)
  • Why I Am Not A “Tiny Little Asian Girl” | Thick Dumpling Skin
    " [I fell into a] group of six or so girls who had known each other through Chinese school and other various gatherings. I was the tallest, the widest and the most non-stereotypical 'Tiny Little Asian Girl.' 

    "This came to their attention very quickly and was pointed out at every opportunity. To me, it seemed like every time one of them felt they were lacking an aspect of being small, fragile, graceful and adorable, they could point out that I was far less. Five plus years later, I still wonder why I put myself through that shattering of self-esteem. The worst of it came when one of the girls flat out told me to my face, “You are not like us, you are not Asian”. It seemed from that moment onwards, I have fought even harder to become one of them. Tiny, skinny, porcelain-faced, jet-black straight hair. This wound festered to the point of attempting to starve myself. Making myself miserable to please those who used me to boost their own self-esteem."

    (tags: race mixedrace bullying weight image bodyimage)
 
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  • http://twitter.com/kimmychoo Kyi D.

    Great stories. NYMag seems to not recall Ms.  Hayworth’s origin though, no?

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Cocojams-Jambalayah/100000590546331 Cocojams Jambalayah

    Nivea’s apology:Thank you for caring enough to give us your feedback about the recent “Re-civilized” NIVEA FOR MEN ad. This ad was inappropriate and offensive. It was never our intention to offend anyone, and for this we are deeply sorry. This ad will never be used again. Diversity and equal opportunity are crucial values of our company.Here’s a version which would have made this apology stronger: Thank you for caring enough to give us your feedback about the recent “Re-civilized” NIVEA FOR MEN ad. This inappropriate and offensive ad should never have been written and approved for use by our company. We should have known that this ad would offend people and we are deeply sorry that we made the mistake of writing this ad and approving its use.  This ad and ads like it will never be used again. Because we consider diversity and equal opportunity to be crucial values, we intend to evaluate what went wrong and rededicate ourselves to those values.

    -snip-

    See the difference?   

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Cocojams-Jambalayah/100000590546331 Cocojams Jambalayah

    Also as an aside, ”Neveah” appears to be a rather popular  birth name for African American girls (judging from my work as a foster care caseworker in Pennsylvania and as a person who enjoys studying naming traditions).  It seems to me that this name wasn’t created or at least wasn’t relatively widely used until the 1990s or later. But I might be mistaken about that. (I see that there is a female R&B, Hip-Hop singer born in 1982 whose name is Nivea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nivea_(singer ) I’ve been told that “Neveah” is the word “heaven”  spelled backwards.  In my experience that name is usually pronounced nah-vay but I have also heard it pronounced nah-VAY-ah.  The negative publicity that the Nivea skin care company is getting for its highly offensive Civilize yourself ad made me think of the possibility that the name Neveah may have originated from the name of this skin care product company. I’m curious. How  is Nivea (skin care product company) and the singer’s name Nivea pronounced? Is it NEH-vee-ah with the first syllable sounding something like the word “crib”?    

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Cocojams-Jambalayah/100000590546331 Cocojams Jambalayah

    An earlier comment that I wrote isn’t showing. To sum up what I wrote,  in my opinion the Nivea company’s apology would have (and should have been) stronger if that apology had admitted that somehow the diversity that the company claims to values failed big time. The company should have never approved such an offensive ad and that somehow that ad was approved means that the company needs to seriously study what went wrong and do something about it-including hiring more People of Color in decisiion making positions.

    Talk is cheap. It’s easy for them to say that the ad is offensive and inappropriate. How then did it pass inspection and what are they doing to ensure that other culturally incompetent ads aren’t also approved by those who should have vetoed them?

  • http://jasminllenadegracia.blogspot.com Jasmin

    I notice lots of apologies fail to mention why it’s “offensive and inappropriate”. Do the people at Nivea even know, or are they just basing their reaction on the negative attention?