Epic WTF

Better than dressage

So much suppressed sexuality

And it was dedicated to his daughter!

This is really relaxing. Surely an un-tapped asmr resource!

Would be good to have his internal commentary dubbed over the top of it.

X post from BLM thread. Wt actual fuck, Cinelli?

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I prefer their full English one

Looks like Paul Smith has pulled the racist one from their store pretty quickly.

Edit: Vanished from Cinelli insta too.

Yes it got taken down quite quickly, also the previous post got a fair few comments when they failed to address it or apologise, just pulled it.

My reaction was a few moments of wondering what the fuss was about and then suddenly clicking. I just saw a stylised person at first and then realised I was being thick. Just goes to show that white middle class opinions are worth fuck all on the matter.

Looking back, I see there is an apology now. I'm struggling to see how the artist didn't know what they were doing, but I could be wrong.
Paul Smith is shite anyway.

I think people underestimate how easy it is for a corporate product decision to be made in a moronically brainless way. End result: cycling cap rubber stamped by (probably) a small group of white middle class people because it never crossed their mind that it could be racist.

Sure, maybe they knew what they're doing but I tend towards the sheltered stupidity explanation.

Is the Artist's design bad? I thought it was just shit.
It was the shoot with the watermelon which had me going WTF

The gollywog cap you mean?
Yes, shite and offensive

Didn't Gucci make this mistake recently?

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It's interesting to see the difference in comments between the previous post and the apology post.

It was the shoot with the watermelon which had me going WTF

Holy shit, I hadn't even noticed that!

It's just possible to visualise a chain of stupid events where ignorant people accidentally created a very racist image. But the design and the shoot were done by Paul Smith, who really should have known.

The gollywog cap

I hadn't made that connection at all, sorry.
Then yes, all in all, terrible design and execution.

Didn't insert company name make this mistake recently?

Call me cynical, but this kind of thing is happening too often recently to be down to mistakes (almost none would be my guess). I bet there's some financial analysis buried somewhere that shows no deleterious effects at worst. Cheap publicity stunts for mentions and clicks followed by 'sincere' apologies? F***ing dreadful. You can guarantee there was no written brief for the creative work from the companies involved. It'll all be deniable conversation only. Chuck some bugger under the bus afterwards when it all blows up, but only if you have to. Only way to stop it is to vote with our wallets.

I mean that one above is like a racist trope bingo card.

Holy shit, I hadn't even noticed that!

How did you not? That's some real big invisible gorilla action you have going.

I guess because I see a fruit rather than potentially racist symbolism, but that's just a product of my privilege in life I guess. That and my autism.

Yeah, now that I have seen the watermelon in that context, there is no way that is a 100% accident. Although, all it takes is a comittee of people like me (as in just saw a stylised human and a piece of fruit at first) to rubber stamp it.

Isn’t the watermelon another American cultural reference point that people who grew up in the UK might be forgiven for not connecting with racist stereotyping of black people?

I had no idea of the connection until I googled it, I’d always associated the watermelon with Mediterranean and south Asian fruit medleys as this is how I first encountered them.

I suppose it doesn't matter. Its racist and an international brand should do better than that, mistake or not. I agree with you though, assuming that everybody sees it for what is is immediately is not constructive.

an international brand should do better than that

This. I knew about it and I'm from a parochial hell hole with no concept of diversity. Marketing departments for international brands "missing" this is borderline criminal.