In case you missed it, here’s my appearance on Fox 11 Los Angeles breaking down the controversy with Pepsi’s latest ad that features Kendall Jenner.
Now, I’m sure the folks who put that ad together were hi-fiving each other and felt really good about the finished product–because most people who commit cultural appropriation usually do. Which begs the question–did Pepsi’s ad agency or Pepsi themselves have anyone at all who was African American who said, ‘hold up, we can’t do this’? This is usually what happens when there are no conscious Black people working at a level where their opinion actually matters in the process–decision makers. And why is Pepsi the only one apologizing? As much as Kendall Jenner and fam try to indoctrinate themselves into Black culture you’d think she’d be a little bit more enlightened even if the folks at Pepsi weren’t. In other words, she needs to apologize too and not just delete social media references to the ad. She was very, very complicit.