CNN asked, “Was February 2016 the best Black History Month ever?” From #OscarsSoWhite to Beyoncé’s So Black, CNN declared a plethora of progress took place in a 29-day span. Okay, except it sure didn’t happen in the advertising industry. For starters, there appeared to be a dramatic decline in BHM advertisements. White advertising agencies allegedly held meetings to discuss avoiding another Campbell Ewald debacle. USA TODAY claimed Super Bowl 50 ads put diversity on display—ignoring that the “diversity” was created via exclusivity. Benetton blew diversity big time. Bartle Bogle Hegarty celebrated Black sheep with White shit. The AAF mimicked the Academy Awards with its 2016 Advertising Hall of Fame inductees. There was IPG, IPA and IPO bullshit—as well as bullshit from another White man who diverted diversity in defense of dames. Ogilvy helped NASCAR and IBM reach diverse audiences with Caucasian campaigns. Sure, Michael Houston and Vann Graves presented positive moments, but their achievements did not offset the diversity business as usual on Madison Avenue.
3 comments:
I've definitely noticed a slow fade and eventual death of the Black History Month ads. In the print world, you could always (if you were a black owned publication) count on a few of those each year, solid. Then they started to drip away and now there are barely any left. The quality has gone up and down considerably but is now just stock photos and bad layouts or reused ads from prior years.
I'm not sure if it's a sign of the times, or lack of anybody speaking up about it. I don't think you'll have BHM ads five years from now for instance. Probably just Total Market ads reused (one black face, one disabled, one white female, someone in a hijab, one ambiguously ethnic to look Asian and/or Hispanic at the same time). Then slap some BHM wordage over the top and call it a day.
Bullshit is that MullenLowe is going to whitesplain to our industry how marketing targeting Blacks and Latin@s is bad, and Total Market is good.
http://schedule.sxsw.com/2016/events/event_PP48230
Sorry, but this pisses me off. We've seen firsthand that a shift towards "don't target ethnic groups, bring them into the fold!" just means minority ad agencies FOLDING, and the few minority CDs and execs we have left FOLDING up and going home.
White agencies sure as hell don't hire anybody ethnic in positions of power when they go Total Market. Ad money does NOT come down into our communities. All agencies like MullenLowe do is eat up the few crumbs we do have for themselves, and keep shoveling that entire all-white pie in their own mouths.
More bullshit! Last day of Black History Month and Campbell Ewald (of Ghetto Day fame) decided to come out of hiding to show their 99% white team helping the downtrodden poor.
Here's an idea. How about helping some of the downtrodden blacks in advertising than hiring more than, say, one of them at a time. And purposely making sure they're in the front row of every one of your photos, covering up for the 99% white faces in your agency behind them.
Maybe then you can avoid Ghetto Day 2.0.
https://twitter.com/CampbellEwald/status/704433656215932928
Post a Comment