Sunday, February 6, 2011

The Pepsi Max Super Bowl Ad with the “Angry Black Woman” – Take a Look

Are we overreacting to the Pepsi Max portrayal of the “Angry Black Woman?”

1 comment:

CA3 said...

In the years before Youtube, the only reason I would have to stay home close to the TV during the Super-Bowl was for the singular benefit of catching Super Bowl commercials. I'm not motivated to watch sports, professional or otherwise. I sit on my butt enough as is at home, work and school. If the claims made by various health organizations are correct, too many Americans are doing too much of that themselves. I thank god I at least workout and bicycle regularly.

The events that go on in Super-Bowl commercials are hilarious, if not outrageous though, and that's what has us watch them. We want to see what lengths the advertisers will go to pitch their latest wares, goods, and services. Oftentimes the pitch is so powerful, it overshadows the product. So much so, that I'm really hard pressed to remember what was advertised at all most of the time. I'm a cheap bastard though, so I likely wouldn't get it anyway.

Now while I will likely never buy the products, I still admire the wittiness of the writers script, and I applaud the actors and directors for pulling it off. I also re-learn to respect the power of commerce, because I've watch enough documentaries, heard enough stories, and read enough books that remind me that advertisements targeting Blacks didn't happen until fairly recently. That blacks weren't considered worth the time or effort. Now, will there be people who will assume that this is how African-American married couples act towards each other with exclusivity? I honestly couldn't say, but why worry about that now?

I can confidently say this much, you'll have to start working on your imagination. With the exception of Asian women, I would have little problem imagining any variation of American women doing the same thigh throughout this commercial. Ok, scratch that, I've known some pretty hostile and assertive Asian women unafraid to throw a decent punch.

Seriously though, I expect that tomorrow, the bulk of the country will be trying out Pepsi Max, possibly for the first time, like the soda swilling sheep they are. While that goes on, I think that if black America discusses this commercial in any seriousness, there will be a fixation on the commercial's final scene of a black man finding a white woman aesthetically pleasing and she the same of him.