Stop Putting Dancing Black People in Ads
How we portray Black people informs our unconscious thoughts
It’s true. Advertising nowadays does a much better job of featuring a wide variety of people than it did a couple of decades ago. Black. Asian. Latino. Interracial couples. You name it.
In fact, the diversity in ads has some people fuming that Black people are now disproportionately represented in commercials. It’s a result of that damn “woke” crap, they complain.
Now, it’s no surprise that these same people never complained when white folks were disproportionately the only ones featured. Go figure.
Today Black people represent 12% of the U.S. population but are featured in some 40% of television ads.
In the U.K., Black people are less than 3% of the population but are in 37% of the commercials.
I’m not so worried that companies are finally featuring more people of color. Or that they want to target new markets they may have ignored in the past. Or that they want to correct their past wrongs. It’s not like anything bad is going to happen to white folks because we now see a lot of interracial couples on the screen.
There’s another good reason why diversity is front and center, and it’s financial. Over 60% of consumers say…
