The Qiaobi-brand laundry detergent video, a white paint-smeared black man confidently approaches a young Chinese woman who shoves detergent placed in his mouth and pushes him into a washing machine to get rinsed. After the wash cycle is over, a Chinese man emerges from inside wearing pristine clothes.
The ad sparked outrage also beyond Chinese boundaries after it appeared on television and before the screening of movies at various cinema halls in China.
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The video was shared on Facebook by American expat Christopher Powell, a musician with the Guiyang Symphony Orchestra, who said, simply: "I'm appalled."
According to website Shanghaiist, "As any foreigner who has ever lived in China can attest, attitudes regarding race and skin color are often quite different here from back home. Still even with prior experience, sometimes this country can leave you completely and utterly dumbfounded.
"Thanks to traditional beauty standards valuing white skin, many Chinese people have a well-established phobia of dark skin which unfortunately also breeds racist attitudes towards people of African descent, who are viewed by some as "dirty" simply because of their skin tone."
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Shanghaiist also notes that the advert is a "blatant ripoff" of an Italian advertising campaign of some years ago, which had similar racial overtones.
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First Published:
27 May 2016 04:20 AM
