“Live for Now Moments Anthem” (2017), also known as #PepsiLivesMatter, is an ad for Pepsi, a US soft drink. It stars Kendall Jenner, a model best known for appearing on the reality TV show “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” (2007- ). The ad came out on April 4th, marking the 49th anniversary of the death of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. The ad has a civil rights theme.
The ad is two and a half minutes long. In the main part Jenner is modelling expensive clothes when she sees a street protest passing by. The protesters hold up signs saying things like “Love”, “Peace” and “Join the Conversation.” She takes off her blonde wig, handing it to a Black woman, smears off her purple lipstick with the back of her hand, and joins the protest. Somehow she has changed into blue jeans. When faced with the police, she steps forward and gives one of them a Pepsi. Everyone is happy!
Culturally sensitive: Noting the African American love of dance and the Asian American love of classical music, the ad shows Black people dancing and an Asian man playing a cello. It also shows a pretty woman in a hijab shooting video – without getting arrested!
Proud tradition: Kendall Jenner is part of a proud tradition in the US of White women who help people of colour, women like:
- LouAnne Johnson – played by Michelle Pfeiffer in “Dangerous Minds” (1995)
- Erin Gruwell – played by Hillary Swank in “Freedom Writers” (2007)
- Leigh Anne Tuohy – played by Sandra Bullock in “The Blind Side” (2009)
- Eugenia Phelan – played by Emma Stone in “The Help” (2011)
Timely: The ad is especially timely as Attorney General Jeff Sessions has just put on hold police reforms in cities like Baltimore, Cleveland, Chicago and Ferguson, cities troubled by police brutality and unconstitutional policing. The need for protest is not going away anytime soon.
Proper protest tactics: Thanks to the ad, we now know why Black Lives Matter, #NoDAPL and other protests have been repeatedly met with heavy-handed, sometimes violent, policing: no White women and no Pepsi:
Even in the 1960s, civil rights protesters made the same mistake:
As Bernice King, daughter of Martin Luther King, put it:
“If only Daddy would have known about the power of #Pepsi.”
The ad was widely misunderstood and mocked. Some said the ad was tasteless, tone-deaf, full of racist tropes, or that Pepsi was trying to make money off the struggles of others. Some wondered if Pepsi has any Black people who sign off on its global advertising campaigns.
Pepsi pulled the ad within 24 hours with this apology, to the world and to Miss Jenner:
“Pepsi was trying to project a global message of unity, peace and understanding. Clearly we missed the mark, and we apologize. We did not intend to make light of any serious issue. We are removing the content and halting any further rollout. We also apologize for putting Kendall Jenner in this position.”
Sniff.
– Abagond, 2017.
See also:
- YouTube: Live for Now Moments Anthem – see the whole ad
- Pepsi Max: Love Hurts
- Jeff Sessions
- The police
- protest
- White Saviour
- Kumbayah anti-racism
- Kim Kardashian – Kendall Jenner’s half sister
550
Reblogged this on The Militant Negro™.
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Try this again
Hopefully this works. Delete the other image.
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@sharinalr
+1000
@”Some said the ad was tasteless, tone-deaf, full of racist tropes, or that Pepsi was trying to make money off the struggles of others.”
What else do you expect in a system of white supremacy aka white inferiority complex?
Pepsi is hardly alone:
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Resw,
Exactly. The subliminal messages are everywhere.
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I watched this and the sad part is, it could have been salvaged by some subtle changes. Maybe a narration of her explaining why she felt the need to leave her comfort zone and join a real cause.
But the message of peace and unity is too generic and the pulling off of the blonde wig… Eww.
The fist bump with the black guy, the bad acting by the lady in the headscarf…
It’s just not genuine and the final message that all it takes is a beverage to heal us… Yeah well I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, but it’s one thing to express that sentiment and it’s another to try to sell that mesaage on the back of real struggles
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I’m a Coke (a cola) girl all the way myself. Pepsi is as rank as their advertising campaigns.
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“Sniff.”
LOL! Love it.
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Pepsi achieved its objective. We are all talking about a second rate product that climbed on the backs of people with legitimate grievances for commercial purposes.
“Oooh we are so sorry”….wink…nod….increased sales.
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Who knew that all we needed to keep from getting shot by a racist trigger happy cop was to hand him an ice cold Pepsi.
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Where was Pepsi promoting peace and understanding when these brothers were searching for the same thing in Oakland, Ca., huh! (1967) Get the EFF outta here with that BS!
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LOM
The “swastika” was not always a nazi symbol.
http://www.holocaust-trc.org/the-holocaust-education-program-resource-guide/the-swastika/
White the government poising the water you are likely in the same boat as a soda drinker.
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@sharinalr:
Depends on the context the Swastika was used. If Coca-Cola used it in Asia, it’s obviously fine. In a Western country, if the context has to do with Hindu, Buddhist or Jain cultural tradition (which is why you find swastikas all over Asia) then it’s also fine. But outside that, in a Western country, the default meaning of the Swastika is an association with Nazism.
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@Chinnam
I know what the default meaning is in the western countries, but my point is that it was not always that meaning that many westerners apply to it.
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@ Chinnam
The comment that started this, by ASG-M above, specifically stated that he was speaking of the use of the swastika before Hitler’s rise to power, yet ASG-M seemed to be implying the swastika was a racist symbol even prior to the 1930s and seemed to be trying to link it to Jim Crow. Sharina was right to correct him.
You are correct about the predominate meaning of the swastika in the West since Hitler. But it is a religious symbol stolen by racist white people and made into something objectionable. I for one would like to see the original meaning come back in the West as well. It’s wrong that a symbol which is holy and sacred to millions of POC has been perverted in meaning by white Westerners.
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I haven’t forgiven Pepsi since his hair caught on fire while trying to make that commercial in the 80’s.
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I meant to say i haven’t forgiven Pepsi since MJ’s hair caught on fire trying to make that commercial in the 80’s.
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I doubt if Kendall Jenner even realizes how offensive this commercial is, seeing how her family are the ultimate culture vultures of black culture. Maybe Pepsi will hire more black and people of color to work on their ad campaigns before they let these stupid things see the light of day. And to think this atrocity happened on the anniversary of MLK’s murder. Pepsi was just being tone deaf and clueless just like the dominant culture in America so it doesn’t surprise me that they would come up with something so idiotic.
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This article is a good one on this Pepsi ad, methinks.
http://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/04/05/25059127/if-you-give-a-cop-a-pepsi
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What till you see the porn version:
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I thought the ad pretty accurately depicted a protest Jenner might go to.
“Join the conversation” sounds like “Let’s have a conversation about…”.Who talks like that. If they want to have a conversatoin they should make a statement. With content.
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