The brand Dove presented a new ad on Facebook that obviously depicts the racist thoughts that Black is dirty and white is clean. I could dig deeper into the interpretation of this horrible ad, but we’ll just stay surface level for now. The ad, shown below, shows a black woman at the top of a square collage photo and a white woman at the bottom. The black woman is wearing what seems to be a brown skin-toned t-shirt that the white woman is seen taking off to showcase her beige skin-toned t-shirt.
If you don’t see the problem yet, we will get into it very soon. Since the posting of the ad and from of course an expected backlash, the ad has been taken down. After the ad was removed, the next predicted action was taken. A sorry of an excuse apology.
2017 removed Dove ad
People that do not understand why this ad is not okay, will not understand why some people do not accept their apology. This ad should have been a red flag when it was presented to the team that approves any advertisement that is shown to the public. That is a problem within itself because it goes to show how blind you are about the racism and the representation of black people in advertisement. When this idea was brainstormed, someone should have immediately seen how this could have been negatively interpreted or offensive to black people. Instead, no one saw the problem and now I am writing this article.
This isn’t the first time Dove was under scrutiny for such misrepresentation. In 2011, Dove released an ad that showed three women standing in a straight line in bath towels from darkest to lightest and behind them shows a before (dirty and dry skin) and after (clean and moisturized skin). The illustration below, again interprets Black or darker skin as dirty and whiter skin as the opposite. Now, some may feel our interpretation of each ad is a reach but history has shown us that advertisements are known to misinterpret people of color and even brainwash us. So simple aligning of background charts of dry and moisturized skin can have an effect on people looking at this ad, especially children.
Dove 2011 ad
Almost, if not 24 hours ago, Dove issued their apology on Facebook (and a shorter version on twitter):
Dove is committed to representing the beauty of diversity. In an image we posted this week, we missed the mark in thoughtfully representing women of color and we deeply regret the offense that it has caused. The feedback that has been shared is important to us and we’ll use it to guide us in the future.
Sorry but not sorry, this apology is bogus. As previously stated, it has been done before, so I do not believe that Dove will not make this mistake again. Especially if they are just issuing out a predicted apology rather than really seeing the problem. “We missed the mark in thoughtfully representing women of color” you were so far off when you decided to put two women in skin toned t-shirts and having one metaphorically shed off her skin to a “cleaner” white skin. Please explain to me how this could have positively represented women of color? How is this even an attempt that you can say that you missed the mark to represent us? This apology is generic, insincere and I do not accept. Please do better!