Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

BBC Trending wrote: "No... that lil white girl [in the old photo] looks fierce. The beautiful black girl [in the new photo] looks pissed," wrote one.

That beautiful black girl in the modern pic has exactly the same expression as the beautiful white girl on the far right in the modern pic. Or are we not supposed to notice that?

 sebster wrote:
I saw this image last night when it showed up... somewhere, NPR maybe? I looked at the image and couldn't figure out what was wrong until I read the article. Once it was explained it seemed like a really long stretch. I guess this kind of thing comes with the turf, activists will tend to be hyper-sensitive.

Part of the issue with the offended crowd. If something exists it can be considered offensive to one group or another. It's patently absurd. Gotta wonder how if at all our ancestors dealth with censorship. I mean the most I remember was men getting man boobs shown and to desensitize people to seeing them somewhat. You guys would laugh what one of my older co-workers said once. He said when elvis Presley sang and danced the way he moved his hips was censored on tv. Can you believe that? Move your hips in too sexy of a fashion and it can't be shown on tv.

Censorship has definitely found itself in interesting places sometimes.

Image doesn't look racist to me. Some of the reactions to people calling it racist do seem pretty racist. I'd say they should pull the ad, not because I find it offensive but the kind of people that would be really annoyed by them doing so are the kind of people I enjoy seeing annoyed.

In the context of the US experience of racial discrimination it's passively racist.

The whole pic clearly has been carefully posed, unlike the kind of shots used by Joules in the UK, which look far more spontaneous and natural.

As we can see, in this picture the black girl literally is being leant on. This very obviously can be construed as her being held down or suppressed by the much larger white girl. I saw that instantly myself, and I'm a middle-aged, middle-class, British white guy. No wonder the highly sensitive black community of the US has reacted negatively. Even if I had not seen the thread title first, I think I would still have gone "oh dear..." straight away.

Failure by GAP's ad team to imagine this possible outcome of their scenario is passive racism in the sense that they simply didn't consider the possible effect of the look and feel of the piece. They never stopped to think how it would look, or what black people might think of it. Their creative process basically ignored black people.

 Chongara wrote:
Image doesn't look racist to me. Some of the reactions to people calling it racist do seem pretty racist. I'd say they should pull the ad, not because I find it offensive but the kind of people that would be really annoyed by them doing so are the kind of people I enjoy seeing annoyed.

I can see some merit in this.

The new photo looks like a poor imitation of the old. It's not racist, it looks quite dull, both for us and the children in it.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:

 sebster wrote:
I saw this image last night when it showed up... somewhere, NPR maybe? I looked at the image and couldn't figure out what was wrong until I read the article. Once it was explained it seemed like a really long stretch. I guess this kind of thing comes with the turf, activists will tend to be hyper-sensitive.

Part of the issue with the offended crowd. If something exists it can be considered offensive to one group or another. It's patently absurd. Gotta wonder how if at all our ancestors dealth with censorship. I mean the most I remember was men getting man boobs shown and to desensitize people to seeing them somewhat. You guys would laugh what one of my older co-workers said once. He said when elvis Presley sang and danced the way he moved his hips was censored on tv. Can you believe that? Move your hips in too sexy of a fashion and it can't be shown on tv.

Censorship has definitely found itself in interesting places sometimes.

Our ancestors burned people at the stake for having odd ideas.

I see a bunch of kids getting there picture taken.... In below average clothes.

You don't see a large white girl leaning on a small black girl?

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 flamingkillamajig wrote:

 sebster wrote:
I saw this image last night when it showed up... somewhere, NPR maybe? I looked at the image and couldn't figure out what was wrong until I read the article. Once it was explained it seemed like a really long stretch. I guess this kind of thing comes with the turf, activists will tend to be hyper-sensitive.

Part of the issue with the offended crowd. If something exists it can be considered offensive to one group or another. It's patently absurd. Gotta wonder how if at all our ancestors dealth with censorship. I mean the most I remember was men getting man boobs shown and to desensitize people to seeing them somewhat. You guys would laugh what one of my older co-workers said once. He said when elvis Presley sang and danced the way he moved his hips was censored on tv. Can you believe that? Move your hips in too sexy of a fashion and it can't be shown on tv.

Censorship has definitely found itself in interesting places sometimes.

Our ancestors burned people at the stake for having odd ideas.

Meh, hanging was more common. Burning at the stake was for your less mainstream SJW type of the time.

Hahah. Turns out the two girls involved in "the lean" are sisters.

People need to find something better to do and be outraged over.

That doesn't make it not passive racism to make an advert with a big white girl leaning on a small black girl.

Everybody's a Little Racist:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RovF1zsDoeM

It's not racist, and it's absurd it was taken that way.

Every group will have its fringe lunatics that complain about everything.

What makes you say it's not (passively) racist?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
What makes you say it's not (passively) racist?

I'm just not seeing the racism. But is that because I'm white and am thus oblivious to the racist element? Or is it that there really is no racist element?

Eh, I guess I can see where a hyper sensitive person would construe it as such. I find it a very long stretch though.

The disconnect I guess I'm having is the "passive" part.

Don't use this term on Dakka. Reds8n

spam deleted.

reds8n

If you have nothing useful to add to the conversation other than cheap racial slurs and jokes then do not post.

Or your arse is outta here.

Is the picture in itself racist? No, I would say not.

Could the picture have racist connotations in a society with a culture of a deep racial divide where race is a divisive issue? Yes.

I don't think GAP intended anything by this. I do think that many of the responses have been driven themselves by racism or an persecution complex, but this picture also seems rather insensitive and ill considered.

 Breotan wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
What makes you say it's not (passively) racist?

I'm just not seeing the racism. But is that because I'm white and am thus oblivious to the racist element? Or is it that there really is no racist element?

The picture, which clearly is a posed shot of models not a candid shot, shows a tall white girl leaning on the head of a smaller black girl.

Obviously being white it is more difficult, but can you see how in the background of the history of white on black racism in the USA, this picture might appear to a black audience to be racist? Taller height and position of physical dominance, being imposed by a white person on a black person. It's a pretty obvious trigger.

Given that point, why did GAP use such a shot? They didn't sit down and go, "Bua ha ha! What can we do to piss off black people this month?" But equally, they went through the whole process of imagining and creating the shot without considering that black people might perceive it differently to the GAP designers.

In other words, they forgot to include black people in their mental audience for the ad.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

Given that point, why did GAP use such a shot? They didn't sit down and go, "Bua ha ha! What can we do to piss off black people this month?" But equally, they went through the whole process of imagining and creating the shot without considering that black people might perceive it differently to the GAP designers.

In other words, they forgot to include black people in their mental audience for the ad.

Do we know the racial make up of the team at GAP that came up with this photo? Your post seems to suggest that no black people were involved with, or saw, this photo before it went public (which I find hard to believe, as there is a black person IN the photo). I cannot find that information anywhere.

Im much more concerned about the sexualisation of the children here. I mean the girl on the right is clearly flaunting her bits and the one of the left into some sort of karma sutra nastiness.

Does anyone have an address where I can write a strongly worded letter to GAP expressing my shock and horror?
Thanking you in advance.

I think the notion that gap isn't diverse or didn't have a diverse audience in mind is laughable. If you look through their history of advertising, they're perhaps the most diverse clothing chain outside of benneton.

That's a big reason I find this whole outrage silly.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
In the context of the US experience of racial discrimination it's passively racist.

The whole pic clearly has been carefully posed, unlike the kind of shots used by Joules in the UK, which look far more spontaneous and natural.

As we can see, in this picture the black girl literally is being leant on. This very obviously can be construed as her being held down or suppressed by the much larger white girl. I saw that instantly myself, and I'm a middle-aged, middle-class, British white guy. No wonder the highly sensitive black community of the US has reacted negatively. Even if I had not seen the thread title first, I think I would still have gone "oh dear..." straight away.

Failure by GAP's ad team to imagine this possible outcome of their scenario is passive racism in the sense that they simply didn't consider the possible effect of the look and feel of the piece. They never stopped to think how it would look, or what black people might think of it. Their creative process basically ignored black people.

It's just a replay of the old picture with a short White girl being leaned on. The true message here is that short people, whatever their color, are nothing but props for tall people!

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The picture, which clearly is a posed shot of models not a candid shot, shows a tall white girl leaning on the head of a smaller black girl.

Obviously being white it is more difficult, but can you see how in the background of the history of white on black racism in the USA, this picture might appear to a black audience to be racist? Taller height and position of physical dominance, being imposed by a white person on a black person. It's a pretty obvious trigger.

Given that point, why did GAP use such a shot? They didn't sit down and go, "Bua ha ha! What can we do to piss off black people this month?" But equally, they went through the whole process of imagining and creating the shot without considering that black people might perceive it differently to the GAP designers.

In other words, they forgot to include black people in their mental audience for the ad.

My problem with the logic you are presenting in the post above is that it makes assumptions about motivation. You assume no black people were present during the shoot, or that they didn't have input on the production of the ad. How do you know that, and if you don't actually know the demographics of the advertising team responsible for producing this image, how can you then proclaim that this image is the result of passive racism? Especially given the precedent set by Gap with the older ad that featured a tall black girl leaning on a short white girl. It is almost identical shot-wise, down to the bored expressions on the kids' faces.

Perhaps this is just how Gap's ad team arrange and shoot groups of kids of various heights?

It's a picture of some kids. Jeez. People need to relax.

This kind of reminds me of the Far Cry 4 controversy. Given the exploitation of other races by white people over the centuries it's understandable why non-whites would be sensitive about that kind of pose. To them, it reinforces the concept of "mighty whitey". Do I agree with them? Not really, I think the photo is just bland marketing that happened to have a white girl leaning on a black girl. But I can understand where the offended parties are coming from.

Also, it's amazing how callous some people are towards the feelings of groups who have been exploited for centuries.

 TheCustomLime wrote:


Also, it's amazing how callous some people are towards the feelings of groups who have been exploited for centuries.

It's equally amazing how some people want to make everything about race. Not everything boils down to that, but there are people who want to make it so.

There were others that were equally exploited and even murdered because of their religion.

Sounds to me like everything is offensive to someone and instead of letting it go and continuing on with our lives, it's made a big deal of.

It's a picture of some kids. That's it.