|
||||||
|
|
Diversions – Guess What America? You Can Trust Nigerians… Again (Advert)Caught the below commercial while watching 60 Minutes. It exploits the notorious 419 fraud scam that originated in Nigeria. Despite the surprising “happy” ending, I still don’t care for what the commercial insinuates, as it pretty much reinforces the American viewer’s myopic perceptions of Nigerians. The single story continues to prevail unfortunately:
5 comments to Diversions – Guess What America? You Can Trust Nigerians… Again (Advert) |
   |
||||
|
Copyright © 2010 Shadow And Act - All Rights Reserved  View in: Mobile | Standard
|
||||||
i don’t think i’m with you on this. the stereotype already exists and, like all stereotypes, it has some merit, i’m sorry to say. this commercial plays with it and subverts it, in an amusing way. would it be better to ignore it? who does that help? i like it.
Well Reg… we’ve already thoroughly discussed this matter on this blog previously, so I won’t reiterate my argument here; however, I will refer you to all the previous posts that have touched on it, along with the myriad of comments that followed, including mine. Here ya go:
- District 9’s Nigerians: Aliens Vs. Predators Or Following In The Tradition of Keeping Blacks In Their Assigned Movie Zone? : http://www.shadowandact.com/?p=9688
- Diversions – Sony Playstation Ad Calls Nigerians A Nation Of Tricksters; Nigerians Respond: http://www.shadowandact.com/?p=9773
- Me, White Man. You… : http://www.shadowandact.com/?p=10726
- The danger of the single story: http://www.shadowandact.com/?p=11181
Wow, however you feel about the issue, that commercial is an attention-getter. It’s also probably the most racially blatant I’ve ever seen on a commercial. It plays to white fears and negative racial stereotypes (not just black Nigeria, either).
It’s funny that advertisers would put a white guy in the home security commercials because they don’t want to cause a stir, but they’ll gladly do this because it has a positive outcome.
I don’t know about this ad. It’s stupid for the same reason it’s smart. Tambay, I bet they didn’t expect someone like you to be watching CBS, right? Let’s face it: they probably felt safe with this because their audience is whiter and older than the other networks.
It’s a sweet commercial. No awful were stereotypes reinforced, except that of Nigerians as competent businessmen, AND some black actors got work and PAID.
Have your way, that would be one less high profile job for those black actors and the ONLY image on TV that had to do with Nigerians would be the ones in District 9 and NBC Dateline as con men. (and ironically the negative stereotype is reinforced by REAL criminals ripping off Americans everyday, as seen on Dateline, the positive stereotype in this commercial is a FALSE one perpetrated by actors.. hmmm.)
But Tim the only reason the commercial works is because of those awful stereotypes. You have to buy into them in order to even find this humorous! It’s bad judgment . . . not smart branding at all!