On Tuesday (April 4), Pepsi debuted a tone deaf commercial featuring Kendall Jenner lucidly making light of civil rights protests and Black Lives Matter. It took only a day for the soft drink giant to pull the ad following a well deserved dragging on Twitter.
“Pepsi was trying to project a global message of unity, peace and understanding. Clearly, we missed the mark and apologize,” the company said in a statement on Wednesday (April 5). “We did not intend to make light of any serious issue. We are pulling the content and halting any further rollout.” They also issued an apology to KJ for putting her in a position to be scrutinized.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dA5Yq1DLSmQ
Many decried the commercial for being insensitive. The advertisement included peculiar commodities such as Kendall ripping off a blonde wig and handing it over to the nearest black woman, radiant young protesters smiling while holding up vague signs such as “Join the conversation,” Jenner dapping up the nearest black guy with a can of Pepsi and the most disparaging moment, her handing the ubiquitous blue can to a rather attractive cop.
The cop smiles and all is good in the world. Except that’s not the reality to the lot of brave activists who actually have participated in these protests. Past and current activists were typically subjected to being attacked by law enforcement dogs, gassed, pepper sprayed and hosed down with water canons while fighting for equality.
Martin Luther King, Jr.’s daughter Bernice King echoed these sentiments in a Tweet.
“If only Daddy would have known about the power of #Pepsi,” she tweeted along with a black and white photo of her father being pushed back by police officers.
While the ad itself wasn’t a good idea, it did unite people in recognizing that using the plight, hurt and pain of people combatting everyday issues shouldn’t be used to sell sugary soda.
The ad sparked a Twitter storm of folks sarcastically tweeting that if only those protesters, including Ieshia Evans — a black woman who stood her ground while being charged by riot police during a Black Lives Matter protest in Baton Rouge last summer — had a Pepsi they would have been spared from police brutality.
WHITE PEOPLE AND THEIR ENTITLEMENT!!!!
WHITE LIVES DONT MATTER!!!!
CERTAIN WHITE LIVES MATTER!!!!
Only the ones that swallow me whole. After that, she goes back to being an afterthought.
Only the ones that swallow me whole. After that, she goes back to being an afterthought.
CERTAIN WHITE LIVES MATTER!!!!!
White lives have the power and run the world. Black lives don’t really do much but complain lol…..
I feel theirsetimrnts, but do ppl really expect better of Hollywood?!
Ya’ll trippin lol, how you get this much out of a commercial that promotes soft drinks.
What rock have you been living under? Have you watched the commercial? You must get a kick out of going to the movies bc everything must be a surprise with the way you “don’t get it.”
Kendall you insensitive white piece of trash. All you and your family see is dollars signs.
america will be so happy when you and your parasite siblings drop off the face of the earth
this way the world doesn’t have to deal with you fake as clowns.!!!!!
she’s not white, none of the Kardashians are.
This would have been more comical if it was Coke.
NO COKE! PEPSI!
its funny i thought most people were annoyed by it showing these idiots protesting in the first place
damn you just cant satisfy the social justice warriors – what was it – not enough trans people in the video?
A can of Pepsi & a Kardashian got y’all mad…. Let that sink in..
damn look like this bish got hit with the ugly stick a couple times growing up.. shes the ugly duckling in the family no doubt
Stupid fucking kids these days. Want to critisize every little thing.
A lot of cops are bad, but not all of them.
Shit looks like it was promoting unity.
“Shit looks like it was promoting unity” – That’s the problem.
Police kill a few black people but how many black people been killed by a black man!!
Fuck off, Loser.
How about we stop having conflicting opinions on both issues and work together on solutions.
99.9% of all murders of blacks are by blacks.
She looks so hot on this commercial that’s all I care about. Black people will complain at anything, why not start doing something good for the planet.
Like white people who have destroyed the planet. Facts
Damn what would people do if there was no Twitter? making the biggest controversies out of a soda commercial, fuck outta here with that bullshit on focus on your own life, that way the world would be a better place and maybe, maybe we could all get along.
Lazy welfare c00ns will bitch about anything.
People are debating between black and white in the comments. This is not even about that lol This is just a case of the media stirring some shit up like always. To me its almost like the media wants us to beef. Im white and i dont hate blacks. Do they complain? yes just like white people who feel that self entitlement. Not all the police shootings and killlings are right but some are. Actually probably 80%. More blacks kill blacks everyday. Maybe that should be the priority in cleaning that up. Its crazy to me how this is such a big thing still today. The hippies holding the peace signs and the fact that they think a jenner should be in this commercial is more irritating to me. What do we need to have unity again? another 9/11?? thats when i believe america was unified most because we stood together to say fuck anyone else.
Where the fuck in this commercial does it make light of BLM? There is maybe 5 black people in this whole commercial. I swear people just like to bitch about anything! Fuck Pepsi BTW!
That commercial was horrible dispite any racial stereotypes involved. The key is how the portray the younger generation as weak and easy influenced then used that to promote a product there trying to market towrds the same generation of younger consumers. Everyone was drinking Pepsi? When does that ever happen and notice it was multiple kinds of Pepsi? Depending in the person? Asian guy had a black can cause hes an “edgy artist” the attractive women at the table drinking diet from a glass bottle? All just pyschlogical subliminal imaging. It only would have been better if she handed the pepsi to a white cop.
Btw MLK drank Coca-Cola
Finally A Kardashian who isn’t a total moron. Fuck Black Lives Matter, Fuck The KKK, Fuck Islam, and Fuck all other hate groups and hateful ideologies.
So the complaint is that protest groups don’t like to be labeled as pepsi drinkers? This is another attempt by hiphopdx staff to promote race baiting by including the hate group Black Lives Matter in the headline. There is nothing wrong with someone giving a police officer a pepsi in a pepsi commercial. Stop looking so hard to find something people will think is racist.