This advertisement was shown fairly recently. It depicts Ashton Kutcher with 'brown face' and other make-up to make him look like someone from India. In my eyes, the ad seems very mild, but it received much criticism and was taken down almost immediately. I am one who enjoys a funny joke whether it be racist or not. Sometimes actually I feel as if some of the funniest ones include elements of racism or are mainly based on some sort of racist behavior. I'm a heavy believer in freedom of speech. I also believe that even though words can be hurtful, they are just words. By that I mean that I don't feel that racist speech is so bad when in the form of simple humor. In short, good racist jokes are funny just like any other good jokes and that is all. For example, Dave Chappelle had a hilarious comedy show that contained a LOT of racism. But, the good part was that he used the funny stereotypical actions of all races in his skits or parodies. He made fun of white people, black people, asian people, latino people, whoever, and made it funny as hell. One of his funniest acts was in the form of a white news reporter where he used his 'white guy voice' to cover the racial draft, where he also appeared as different people to be selected by races if they had mixed ethnicity. Back to the point, I feel as if the consumers in the US are a little too thin skinned when it comes to advertisements, or anything racist for that matter. Now I get the fact that if you offend people they won't buy your products, but comedy in the form of an advertisement is getting scarce because companies are too worried about offending people. The result has been this surge of stupid pointless commercials and ads that are either so cheesy they suck or are just simply not funny. Making uninteresting, piece-of-shit ads is not the answer.. Companies need to find a new way to make it around the fear of being offensive.
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
RACISM is amusing
This advertisement was shown fairly recently. It depicts Ashton Kutcher with 'brown face' and other make-up to make him look like someone from India. In my eyes, the ad seems very mild, but it received much criticism and was taken down almost immediately. I am one who enjoys a funny joke whether it be racist or not. Sometimes actually I feel as if some of the funniest ones include elements of racism or are mainly based on some sort of racist behavior. I'm a heavy believer in freedom of speech. I also believe that even though words can be hurtful, they are just words. By that I mean that I don't feel that racist speech is so bad when in the form of simple humor. In short, good racist jokes are funny just like any other good jokes and that is all. For example, Dave Chappelle had a hilarious comedy show that contained a LOT of racism. But, the good part was that he used the funny stereotypical actions of all races in his skits or parodies. He made fun of white people, black people, asian people, latino people, whoever, and made it funny as hell. One of his funniest acts was in the form of a white news reporter where he used his 'white guy voice' to cover the racial draft, where he also appeared as different people to be selected by races if they had mixed ethnicity. Back to the point, I feel as if the consumers in the US are a little too thin skinned when it comes to advertisements, or anything racist for that matter. Now I get the fact that if you offend people they won't buy your products, but comedy in the form of an advertisement is getting scarce because companies are too worried about offending people. The result has been this surge of stupid pointless commercials and ads that are either so cheesy they suck or are just simply not funny. Making uninteresting, piece-of-shit ads is not the answer.. Companies need to find a new way to make it around the fear of being offensive.
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Use of humor in advertising is, of course, a powerful tool and you are right to cite freedom of speech. However, you must remember that no-one should feel insulted, denigrated or humiliated because of who they are - ads like this only serve to ridicule and offend. Why? Because they make fun of a whole race of people through over exaggerated characteristics or traits. Freedom of speech is fine, but not when it is used to belittle others. This ad was quite rightly pulled and does nothing to advance a positive image of advertising in consumers' minds. The ad agency and Ashton Kutcher should have known better. But you put your opinion across in your own voice - however, if you are going to take a strong position you must support your argument with quotes and references in order to legitimise your standpoint.
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