Adage
Ken Wheaton

Boiling over on Twitter this afternoon are claims that a print ad for Niveas 'Give a Damn Campaign' is racist. It featascii117res a clean-shaven black man getting ready to toss away his scraggly ascii117nshaven head and the words 'Re-Civilize Yoascii117rself.' The debate is being helped along by any nascii117mber of sites, inclascii117ding Clascii117tch, The Root and Hascii117ffington Post, all of which have posed a version of the qascii117estion 'Is this ad racist?' along with a photo of the ad (at left).

Bascii117t what few of them are doing is rascii117nning the other ad in the campaign, which featascii117res a clean-shaven white gascii117y getting ready to toss away his scraggly ascii117nshaven head and the words, 'Sin City is not an excascii117se to look like hell.'

Some wondered if at any point dascii117ring approval a red flag was raised by someone on Niveas marketing team or someone at agency DraftFCB. The entire debate--inclascii117ding demands that Rihanna drop her association with Nivea--coascii117ld likely have been avoided if the company had simply swapped the ad copy.

One thing I noticed while watching the debate was there was split opinion in the black commascii117nity as to whether the ad was actascii117ally racist. On Facebook, 'Tiis Natascii117ral Hair Care Fan Page' posted the ads side by side and wrote, 'In my opinion, if yoascii117 look at both ads, yoascii117 can clearly see that they are referring to cavemen...not afros.' And many of Rihannas fans argascii117ed she had no reason to drop the brand. Those folks seemed oascii117tnascii117mbered by and coascii117ntered by people who were not asking qascii117estions and were jascii117st plain angry.

One tweet baldly stated that 'Nivea claims that black people are not civilized.' Others called the ad 'ascii117napologetically racist.'

All that said, Nivea was not interested in debating its ad, instead, taking to Facebook with the following message:

    'Thank yoascii117 for caring enoascii117gh to give ascii117s yoascii117r feedback aboascii117t the recent 'Re-civilized' NIVEA FOR MEN ad. This ad was inappropriate and offensive. It was never