Old habits die hard.
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You beat me to it.
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At least it was a “This ad is racist and we’re horrified too” and not “if anyone was offended.”
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I’m giving more serious side-eye to the “races, contests” part of that card, honestly…
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You know, I like my Ford Focus, and I know this was almost a century ago, but I’m still glad I bought my car used. Even better, I smile a bit at the thought of what the people who sponsored and attended this garbage would think of an openly queer, gender-non conforming person like myself. (Also, they’re dead by now, so the world is a fraction better after all.)
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I don’t want to hear corporate executive apologies, I want to hear their screams as they are bricked up behind a wall in the catacombs.
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Not too hard to break that spiky logo up into a triple K…
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Seems topical:
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Yeah, I had exactly the same question. There has to be more. Although the extended version can’t make it any less racist, it’s got to at least make more sense than this.
Remember this was a German ad for the German market, though. Different set of racists.
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Yeah, I assumed there was more to the ad too - it felt like the clip started mid ad.
I couldn’t find a longer version, but apparently it’s “part of a series that follows a love story between a white woman and a dark-skinned man.”
Huh.
Apparently there are a few other dog whistles too: The OK symbol as the the guy gets flicked, and the letters fading in start off with
ER
NE
G
Getting close to spelling out the german N-word.
I mean, normally I hate to read to much into stuff like that, but when you start off with something that bad, well, it does all seem intentional.
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They absolutely knew what they were doing.
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The “Petit Colon” is an after-theatre coffee house, just down the road (in Buenos Aires) from “Teatro Colon”. “Teatro Colon” was named after a great explorer who, in the name of the King and Queen of Spain, “discovered” parts of the Caribbean and South America.
His initial voyage of discovery departed Spain in 1492; the Spanish know him as “Cristóbal Colón”, and have erected many statues in his honour.
I mention this because of the line in the article that suggests the name of the cafe translates to “Little Colonist”, and implies that this is a bad thing. No, the name isn’t “Little Colonist”, it is “Little Columbus”, and references the theatre up the street.
Please try to contain your moral outrage until you have some facts to ignore.
Thanks
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I don’t think that was the biggest problem with this advert. You have disproved nothing.
Please try to contain your outrage about moral outrage.
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Just from Germany’s colonial history…
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Honestly, after dieselgate I’m more than a little disappointed they are still a thing, out there, fucking about. I wish they’d been parted out.
Now that racists have been emboldened over the last four years seemingly everywhere, they’re a more obvious market to pander to than they had been, and VW may see it as going back to their roots.
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This was my take. Make a racist ad. Get pushback. Get more attention. Release a tepid apology that gets another wave of attention. Profit.
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If you mean the dude who started the wholesale extermination of the Island Caribs to the point that most people don’t even realize that’s why the Caribbean has that name anymore, then went to town on the mainland.
“Great” indeed.
So, sure, the idea of a white hand throwing around a POC from a company that made Hitler’s “People’s Car” is slightly better because the name in the background isn’t about colonists in general as it is about the individual who is likely responsible for at least kicking off the largest genocide of POC in our history. Thanks for clearing that up!
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You seriously think there’s any cultural continuity after 75 years, a few years of which the thing was actually run by the British occupation army?
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