I imagine that they had a whole series planned for all the cricket international matches for this year, whereby the lone Aussie supporter would be surrounded by supporters of the other teams according to whichever team was being played at the moment (Brits, South Africans, Indians, New Zealanders, Pakistanis, Srk Lankans AND West Indians) displaying their traditional form of team support and then he cleverly would soften their partisanship against him by offering them food so they could all enjoy the game together (offering the hospitality of food is one of the most traditional ways to indicate the wish for peaceful coexistence, after all).

IF they had had the sense to introduce this concept with one of the other teams, especially with the Brits or Kiwis, and then to include the West Indian supporters as part of the series after it had already been seen in the context of several other teams, THEN they would have a better defence. But to lead the concept with the West Indian supporters shows all sorts of unthinking awareness-fail.

It’s icky because of the chicken. But that’s merely an unfortunate coincidence (that someone in a multinational corporation should have picked up on).

The issue is that some people seem to think it’s totally cool to shut black people up with food products. That is not cool. It could be chicken. It could be a pencil. It could be any freaking thing you want to imagine. But the idea of a white guy giving something to POC to shut them up?

That’s offensive. Maybe it doesn’t offend you. But it is offensive. This is not up for debate.

On a side note, “black people loving fried chicken” isn’t really a racist observation here. Australians don’t understand why Americans are getting so worked up about it…

its really interesting watching both sides.

cheers

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Mike, I’m not sure what your point is. I don’t think that many people in any country would be fully aware of all racism issues in another country; I wouldn’t call that naive.

Regardless, the advertising agency should have thought a bit harder about the implications behind this ad. It doesn’t take an extensive knowledge of worldwide racism history to realise that such an ad would be problematic. But then, when has intelligent thought ever been behind advertising? They’re selling krappy food to the masses, it’s not that hard…

The West Indies has plenty of varied ethnicity. I’m Trinidadian with a Chinese grandfather and a Hispanic last name and plenty of West Indian friends of East Indian descent. There is also the native Carib Indian population who I believe lived there originally so I’ve always seen the West Indies as ethnically diverse.

But what I’d also like to say from having watched the commercial is that it’s really not about the chicken, as others have said. The man in the commercial calls the situation awkward but he’s clearly annoyed at the least to be sitting there. Also, the line he says and the way he hands them the bucket further implies that he didn’t have chicken on hand because he planned on eating it himself but rather that it’s his method of quieting the rowdy West Indians.

I’ve had a little experience in film and editing and it makes me think even more that people haven’t gotten outraged by mistake. The people who created the concept for the commercial and shot it made it racist, despite what the intent was.

Wouldn’t happen, both for the reason that Indigenous Australians (Koori or otherwise) are so very rarely represented in advertising media, and for the same reason it wouldn’t be a woman in the ad: the “standard issue” cricket fan over here is perceived as a white male.

I’m a little surprised by all the Aussies chiming in to say that we don’t have the “black people love fried chicken” stereotype. While we may not have something that specific, it’s certainly a stereotype here that black people eat cheap, rubbish food.

Mike, could that be because ‘Obama Birthers’ not a huge issue in Australia? I think there’s a bit of cultural imperialism going on. Australia is a racist country, but the issues here aren’t identical to those of the USA and it seems to me a bit presumptuous to think that Australians should be aware of that specific controversy and that being unaware is somehow ‘naive’. It’s not something which is played out here. It’s no wonder that people might be unaware.