Photo credit:kenyan-post.com
Earlier this year, H&M came under huge criticisms regarding a racist ad they made about a sweatshirt for sale. It had a black boy pose with the sweatshirt which had the inscription "Coolest monkey in the jungle". This was very distasteful and sometimes you wonder if some of these things are thoroughly thought through. Black twitter and celebrities alike went wild and users tweeted their disgust and vowed never to buy any h&m product.
Photoshop experts also joined in and came up with pictures that showed the inscription change to "king of the world" and were shared thousands and thousands of times. But what people failed to realize was that this issue wasn't going to be about the boy. It was his colour, his race. Editing the picture wasn't going to solve anything because it wasn't about him. He probably didn’t even read much into the inscription. Perhaps he thought "wow I love it". He certainly didn't feel degraded when taking the picture so telling him he's the king of the world wasn't going to change his view about himself. This was a race issue and therefore should have gone higher than the boy
Photo credit:ngpapers.com.ng
Recently, there have been reports of vandalism in h&m shops in South Africa and I must say this is a very dumb way of addressing this issue. Imagine the black workers that have to answer to the bosses. They may lose their jobs and be sued for being accomplice to such actions. It’s sad to think that in this day and age, people have the perception that violence solves anything. That was a really bad idea, whoever brought it up.
Have you noticed how the issue has died down and no one seems to be talking about it? Yes, that's how race issues have been over the years. Someone does something racist, social media goes wild, everyone is talking about it, without resolve, then after a week it dies down. That's the reason such ignorant acts keep happening. The latter part of last year, Joyner Lucas released a song "I'm not racist" and caused a stir. The video showed a black and white guy face to face telling their side and then hugging it out. Even though the hug over simplified the issue at hand, the song sparked a conversation but then it died down. Since there's no resolve, it is now a cycle that is sure to continue for years until something is done about it.
In the end, it is important that people from different races are respected and their rights not infringed upon. I think discussions should go higher than just the social media and the relevant institutions and persons should also be ready to take up the discussions and bring a good solution to these problems. It is also important that strict measures are taken to put put racist-free and offensive ads so as to reduce these issues. Relevant institutions should also put preventive measures in place to ensure that this becomes a thing of the past.
What do you think? Comment below.
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