DA BEST OF

What has AFLAC done to my culture??? Not since MC Hammer danced for chicken in a KFC advertisement have I felt my culture so disrespected through advertising.  Beat boxing frogs, a duck spinning lily pads like turntables, a worm doing the “worm” and a Flavor Flav esque pigeon.  Not to mention the ad that preceded it in which a duck and a pigeon have a break dance battle (which I tried to ignore).   Who exactly thought that this ad was a good idea for one or appealing?  And who exactly was this ad geared towards?

The continuous disrespect of hip-hop culture is embarrassing and frankly getting a little old.  I mean corny old white people or animals rapping isn’t funny any more neither is a mango pineapple call and response. If these companies want to have an authentic relationship with hip-hop they should try including people within the hip-hop culture in their creative process.

This actually speaks to a larger problem in that we see more black faces (no pun intended…. well maybe a little) in advertising but how many African Americans or individuals of hip-hop culture are in position to make decision within the world of advertising.  I’m going to go out on a limb and say there wasn’t a hip-hop presence in the boardroom when any of these ideas were crafted.  If so they were there primarily for semantics.

So I plead to the advertising world please stop disrespecting my culture with these images.  If you choose to use hip-hop as a medium for your advertisements at least have someone of our culture to edit the final cut.  In truth you are turning the hip-hop community away more than embracing us with this nonsense.  I mean would you guys use a song by the Beatles to sell fried chicken…………didn’t think so