Is the VW Super Bowl commercial racist?

[Syt]

It appears some people find this racist:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9H0xPWAtaa8

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2270134/Volkswagen-accused-racism-Super-Bowl-ad-uses-white-actors-Jamaican-accents.html

'It's like blackface with voices': Volkswagen accused of racism for Super Bowl ad that uses white actors with Jamaican accents

- The 60-second commercial called 'racist' and 'off-putting' by prominent critics
- Car maker will spend $8 million to air ad during Sunday's game
- Volkswagen defends ad saying 'they did their homework' and tested it with 100 Jamaicans

German car company Volkswagen's Super Bowl ad today ignited claims of racism over its use of Jamaican accents from white actors with one critic saying 'it's like blackface with voices.'
The 60-second spot, which was unveiled Monday, features a white man who is apparently so happy that he owns a Volkswagen that he speaks with a Jamaican accent as he tries to cheer up others in his office.

But the advert, which will cost the car maker $8 million to air during Sunday's game, has struck many has being offensive since it suggests that all people in the Caribbean are relaxed and don't feel stress.

'It's just saying, ''Black people are happy,''' complained Barbara Lippert, editor-at-large of Mediapost.com, on the Today show.
'Didn't anyone look at this? This is so racist,' she added.

She predicted the car company would pull the ad before the game, which is routinely watched by more than a hundred million viewers and costs companies $4 million for just 30-seconds of airtime.

During a segment Monday on CNN's Starting Point with Soledad O'Brien, New York Times columnist Charles Blow blasted the ad.

'I don't like it all,' he said during the roundtable discussion.

'It's like blackface with voices. I don't like that.'

The ad begins in a crowded office elevator with one person complaining about Mondays, with another quickly chiming in that they are 'the worst.'

'No worries man, everything will be alright,' the Volkswagen owner tells his colleagues in a thick Island accent.

The man is later seen hanging out at the coffee machine and then approaches a co-worker who appears overwhelmed.

'Julia, turn the fround the other way around,' he instructs her.

Later, the man admits to a co-worker that he is from a place as opposite as a tropical island as one can find - Minnesota.

He then tells a conference room full of people hearing terrible news about the company that: 'You know what this room needs? A smile. Who wants to come with us?'

He then takes his boss and another person along for a ride in his red Beetle.

When they get back to the office, an uptight man tells them they are three-minutes late, prompting the other two men in the car to respond in their Jamaican accent 'don't be no cloud on a sunny day' and 'yeah, chill out Winston.'

Tim Mahoney, executive vice president and chief marketing officer for Volkswagen of America, said on CNN that the company consulted with 100 Jamaicans and used a dialect coach on-set to ensure that the accents were accurate.

'We obviously did our homework to make sure that we weren't offensive,' he said.

Mahoney added that famed Jamaican performer Jimmy Cliff sings a cover of the Partridge Family's 'C'mon, Get Happy.'

But that hasn't satisfied everyone.

Christopher John Farley, a Jamaican-born journalist, wrote in the Wall Street Journal that the accents reminded him of the controversial character Jar Jar Binks from the Star Wars movies, who used a Caribbean accent and broken English for comedic effect.

'It's off-putting to see the Island spirit used as a punchline,' he wrote. 

'The Jamaican aesthetic–shaped by such Jamaican-born notables as Bob Marley, Marcus Garvey and the revolutionary Nanny of the Maroons–is founded on positive vibration, not mindless happiness.'

The ad has found a few defenders, however.

During the CNN debate, O'Brien, who has developed a long-running series, 'Black in America' that probes issues of race in the country, said she enjoyed the ad.

And during the segment on the Today show, host Matt Lauer responded to Lippert's criticisms by saying, 'I take a completely different view of it, to be honest with you.

'I thought, If you buy this car, it puts you in a happy place.

'And what's happier then the memories we all have of being on beautiful islands on island time. That's the way I took it,' he said.

And one commentator, Michelle Stalling, on the car company's YouTube page, where the ad has already been viewed more than 500,000 times, wrote, 'Jimmy Cliff and VW. I see positivity and happiness in this Ad. I love it.'

The criticism is rare for the car company, who two years ago produced the most talked-about ad for the Super Bowl.The commercial featuring a young boy pretending to be Darth Vader and remotely 'starting' the car was widely praised.

'It ate up the internet, it was the most popular ad ever,' Lippert said of the 2011 commercial.

'This one is clearly a mistake in judgment.'

[garbon]

I don't understand why they paired Jamaican voices with white people. I think the Jar Jar Binks comments in the article feels about right on.

[derspiess]

Having a sister in law who's a trustafarian and a nephew of color, I feel qualified to speak on this subject.  No, it is not racist.

Seriously, FFS lighten up people. 

[Valmy]

I don't understand why they paired Jamaican voices with white people.

Hey!  Something like 5% of Jamaicans are white people.

Anyway this is more about the reputation of Jamaicans to party and be laid back then about all black people so while it may be playing on a national stereotype it feels odd to characterize as racist.

[Eddie Teach]

Seriously, FFS lighten up people.

This.

[Valmy]

Seriously, FFS lighten up people.

This.

Easy for you to say.  Your race and nationality are not being drawn through the mud by Nazi-descended Germans.

[garbon]

I don't understand why they paired Jamaican voices with white people.

Hey!  Something like 5% of Jamaicans are white people.

Anyway this is more about the reputation of Jamaicans to party and be laid back then about all black people so while it may be playing on a national stereotype it feels odd to characterize as racist.

Oh I agree with you. Really just seems sort of juvenile - isn't it funny when we take the "funny" accent of one group of people and pair with video of another group?

[crazy canuck]

If this add has even made it to the deep recesses of Languish consciousness, it sounds to me like they have hit superbowl ad gold with this one.

[derspiess]

My nephew speaks English with a Jamaicanesque accent.  Cute little guy.  I speak back to him the same way

[Syt]

If this add has even made it to the deep recesses of Languish consciousness, it sounds to me like they have hit superbowl ad gold with this one.

It's nowhere near as good as their 2011 Darth Vader commercial.

[Valmy]

It's nowhere near as good as their 2011 Darth Vader commercial.

Yeah that one was awesome.

[Admiral Yi]

Great ad. Totally awesome Jamaican accent. Still won't buy a Bug.

I think any Jamaicans saw it they would howl with laughter.  Unless maybe they were enrolled in a Black Studies program.

[garbon]

Yi apparently has the right of it

http://news.yahoo.com/jamaica-embraces-controversial-super-bowl-190953703.html

Jamaica embraces controversial Super Bowl ad

Jamaica is embracing a controversial Super Bowl commercial that depicts a white office worker from the U.S. Midwest feigning the Caribbean island's lilting patois accent to display a cheerful, upbeat outlook.

Some U.S. critics have described the pregame Super Bowl ad from Volkswagen of America as offensive and culturally insensitive, apparently seeing the commercial that hit the web on Monday as an echo of segregation-era depictions of white people posing as happy-go-lucky black folk. Jamaica's population is predominantly black.

On NBC's "The Today Show," Barbara Lippert, editor-at-large at mediapost.com, said she believed the commercial was racist because it was "just saying that black people are happy." New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow said during an appearance on CNN that the advertisement was like "blackface with voices."

But the charged reaction has met with puzzlement in Jamaica, which has very visible white, Asian, Middle Eastern and mixed-race minorities that also often speak with the local accent.

The island's government has endorsed the commercial, which shows an ebullient white worker from the U.S. state of Minnesota trying to cheer up glum colleagues with a Jamaican patois accent because he is so happy with his Volkswagen. At the start of the commercial, he paraphrases the lyrics to late reggae icon Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds" as he tells his co-workers: "No worries, mon. Everyting will be all right."

The company's website continues the theme, offering a clip of Jamaica's Jimmy Cliff singing "C'mon, get happy."

On Wednesday, opposition lawmaker Edmund Bartlett said the television ad "is a perfect illustration of Jamaican culture's global reach and our uncharacteristic penchant to be happy even in challenging situations."

Tourism Minister Wykeham McNeill said he believes the Super Bowl commercial has the potential to increase tourist arrivals.

"I think this is a very creative commercial which truly taps into the tremendous appeal that brand Jamaica and its hospitable people have globally," McNeill said in a late Tuesday statement.

At a Kingston bus stop, office assistant Jennifer Blake said she saw the Volkswagen advertisement online and thought it was amusing to see an American trying to speak patois.

"I'm not sure why people would think it was offensive or anything," she said Wednesday, adding that many of her friends have shared links to the commercial on social media.

Nearly all islanders, regardless of class, can speak and understand the country's patois. Jamaica's official language is standard English, but many people cannot speak it.

Those who speak standard English fluently, mostly people from the middle and upper classes, tend to use patois for emphasis or to affect a down-to-earth persona.

A representative for Volkswagen of America said Wednesday morning that the company has no plans to pull the Super Bowl spot.

"As of this morning, we received no consumer calls or complaints about our ad. In fact, we've only received positive endorsements," Scott Vazin, a company spokesman, said in an email.

[garbon]

So basically looks like media being offended.

[Camerus]

The ad plays lightheartedly on stereotypes generally, including the boring, anal middle class white office worker and high-quality German engineering.  It's kind of goofy, but harmless.