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Racist? Or not?

December 27, 2008

Orac presents a very strange advertisement, in a foreign language, and asks; is the ad racist?  Go check it out and give your own opinion.

The interesting part to me is what others see in the ad that I completely missed (and some of which may be strictly in the eye of the beholder).

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  1. December 28, 2008 at 03:28 | #1

    Um.  Crikey.

    I think that commercial was done by Republicons trying to look PC and ending up hitting the utterly wrong note, as per usual.  Joking aside, I’m sure some (white) ad exec thought that would be the perfect way to explain that a black toothpaste shouldn’t be looked down on, but when you use racial strife to sell products, that’s crossing a line too far.  Talk about cheapening the struggle for equality…

  2. December 28, 2008 at 08:54 | #2

    Racist? I dunno. It is unclear to me why the mother had any problem with a guy bringing her child’s balloon to her. The toothpaste thing?

    A memory. When I was overseas, in southeast Asia, there as a brand of toothpaste called “Darkie,” which had a sort of minstrel-show black man with top hat illustration showing huge white teeth. I kept a tube for years, but it finally disappeared.
    Racist? Well, it certainly played on a caricature.

    I guess this particular toothpaste seller is having a hard time getting people to smear turd-colored stuff on their teeth.

  3. gruntled atheist
    December 28, 2008 at 18:41 | #3

    It is a really dumb commercial but dumb commercials often work—Charmin, Maytag, etc.—but this is a really stupid and unnecessary product.  And, Oh Yeah! the ad is completely racist.

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