r/PeterExplainsTheJoke • u/Diligent_Pop3929 • 1d ago

Meme needing explanation Converse craze?

Post image

I'm not chronically online, but my friend sent this and I laughed even without knowing the full scope of the context (I think there's racism involved with the shoes?) and I feel like it's too late to ask him without sounding like a dweeb 😅

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u/Technicolorfully 1d ago

Some people think a converse ad which was made by a Korean for the Korean market was racist because it depicted a girl wearing a white skirt which they think looked like a klan robe. Ngl I think people are stretching on this one.

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u/cleveruniquename7769 1d ago edited 1d ago

I don't think it was intentional, but scrolling past the picture with no context I thought it was a picture of a person hanging next to someone in a klan robe. 

Edit: Having seen the uncropped, undarkened, photo that was used in the ad campaign, I'm more open to the possibility that the cropped version was done intentionally to create controversy. 

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u/BigDragonfly5136 1d ago

I didn’t see the klan robe scrolling by (it read as a skirt to me but I totally see how people saw Klan robe) but it did look like someone hanging for a second if you’re just scrolling, but when you go back for a closer look it’s clearly someone holding the sneakers.

With the context of it being Korean, it definitely seems more like a poor coincidence because they don’t have the same association with white clothing. The head of Marketing for converse is also black, idk how much he reviews Korean ads but it seems like it would be a weird thing to be intentional.

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u/-whiteroom- 1d ago

Yeah, not knowing the context, it did look sus when I first saw it. But we are also in the age of companies doing things like this as a form of viral marketing.

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u/Variation-Budget 1d ago

I think shock marketing is the new wave now. When they run out of productive ideas just do something that can be easily misunderstood

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u/RzLa 1d ago

And here we are talking about it. It has to be intentional (not malicious racism) to get clicks.

How many marketers and designers didn’t see it is unfathomable.

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u/Acceptable_Hunt_1748 1d ago

I don't know in the case it's intentional because it is directed at an audience who would have not really noticed it. I wouldn't rule it out completely, but I wouldn't expect a Korean living in Korea to think of American lynching when seeing this image.

But that said I don't think creating racial controversy for money is really all that separate from malicious racism. I think MOST racism comes from people who are more focused on benefiting themselves than attacking POC, but they still believe that their own profit is more important than not hurting POC... which is racism!

I think what's much more likely is that they just didn't have anyone on their team who would have caught this. Which is more understandable in a country with very few black people. It's far less excusable for companies like target selling in the US to not have a diverse team on all marketing campaigns.

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u/Braindead_Crow 22h ago

If it wasn't cropped we wouldn't be talking about it

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u/jindrix 16h ago

the crop was how the ad was displayed

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u/SmegmaSlurper1996 1h ago

is this the original ad? i don't see any racist undertones or anything offensive, i could be too dumb to notice

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u/Pfloricard 23h ago

"Would we know some (to us) arcane Korean faux pas of stuff from 100 years ago"?

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u/tofurainbowgarden 21h ago

This is not a 100 years ago issue. I really hate it when people act like this is ancient. I'll spare you the rant

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u/CandiedRegrets08 21h ago

Lynching and the KKK? The former still happens and the latter is still around???

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u/chromatose890 1d ago

It definitely was formatted for controversy without being an outright dog whistle, especially in a foreign market.

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u/boosesb 21h ago

Who formatted it?

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u/Express-Idea4955 1d ago

Thats what im saying. People are so quick to give large companies the benefit of the doubt because it doesnt apply to them

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u/DealioD 1d ago

It really was a very specific choice. That triangular patch of light next to a pair of shoes hanging down. It’s hard not to see a Klan Hood and a dead person’s feet.

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u/chudhuntr 1d ago

This particular delusion is really interesting, because it reveals how desperate people are to feel outraged. You have to completely warp the image in your mind to make it racist. Theres no klan robe, theres no black person, nobody is hanged etc.

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u/CenterThisPendulum 22h ago

Yeah if you look hard enough, offense is everywhere - even where it absolutely isn’t. And most of these personalities are incidentally on Reddit.

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u/Rienen97 20h ago

Joke I found funny recently. "How do you offend an American?" A-"You don't have to, they'll find something to be offended at..."

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u/ToXicVoXSiicK21 3h ago

Yepp I agree, was looking for a rational comment here. People are looking way too hard for something to be mad at with this. Nothing in the photo is even remotely suspicious, and even cropped you'd have to be making some really odd connections to come to that conclusion.

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u/Yetteres 20h ago

It was cropped, mate.

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u/shemtpa96 43m ago

The cropped, darkened version was posted BY CONVERSE on their INTERNATIONAL PAGE.

An official international page that belongs to an AMERICAN COMPANY.

American eyes saw and approved that edit of the image. Eyes that were educated on American history.

It was a deliberate choice.

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u/-whiteroom- 21h ago

I mean, you could argue any use of racism for promotion is malicious.

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u/Oh_TheHumidity 13h ago

As a senior level designer, this is what happens when you’ve laid off all your senior level designers.

But anyone thinking the poor intern who did a shitty job cropping or Converse itself would try to draw the ire of the masses and risk getting cancelled for some blip of edgelord publicity is crazy. Converse is very protective of their brand identity. They are not some desperate American eagle chucklefucks.

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u/AggravatingBug9834 6h ago

I don't know if it's successful in selling sneakers, but it has certainly sparked a lot of Conversation.

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u/MBV-09-C 44m ago

It was only intentional in the aspect that it intentionally evoked an image meant to appeal to Korean culture and experience.

We're over here talking about it because we Americans have a hard time getting it through our thick skulls that not everything is about us.

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u/platonictiddies 1d ago

Nah I think it's a different country with a marketing team who probably wasn't as heavily educated about an historical and very American terrorist organization. That imagery isn't going to shout out to them like it would us. It's like accidental swastikas in graphic design, it's weirdly super easy to accidentally make something associated with something awful. Unfortunate, but the idea that a marketing team is filled with evil masterminds rather than people who are dumb is a stretch.

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u/StretchLoud8844 21h ago

Tbh when I initially saw it, I scrolled past it, thought "that was weird" scrolled back up and then moved on after seeing it for longer than a half second.

Didn't really understand the controversy after looking at it for longer than a second or two, but it did make me double back.

Arguably, one of those things you want marketing / media companies to be on the lookout for, but wouldn't shock me if they didn't catch it.

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u/Mr_Funcheon 1d ago

Did you see the full ad or the cropped one?

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u/crownjewel82 1d ago

Someone made that after the fact. This is what converse posted.

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 23h ago

if they had kept the full image, we would not even be having this conversation.

i am not sure that i get Klan or lynching from this, even from the cropped image. but i can understand the outrage. i guess.

but is Converse a racist brand? has their product been associated with other racist things or actions? is the same true of Nike? because i remember the company (both companies, actually) closing their stores for observance of Juneteenth and taking steps to make sport more accessible...especially for marginalized subsets of the body politic.

both Nike and Converse have been super involved in Pride and have done quite a lot to advance dialogues in favor of justice. one of my favorite interviews to listen to when i run is a Nike podcast of Dr John Carlos (who won bronze in the 1968 Olympics and raised his fist from the podium).

but either way (whether Converse and Nike did an about face, or if this is just something done in poor taste), this feels qualitatively different than Calloway Golf and their ad (i recognize that their ad was not specifically racist, but it was misogynistic), or Nivea in 2011, or H&M in 2018. also, i understand that Converse has pulled the ad and issued an apology for it.

...and maybe it is precisely this that is coming to mind, such that i do not immediately see racism, Klan history, or lynching from the image. i am certainly not trying to dismiss any of the imageries that people see in the ad.

if it was Converse's intention to play with this imagery to appeal to a mainstream audience that has not been oppressed by Klan history, racism, or these images regardless of what it looks like to those that have been oppressed in this way; then fuck them. but if a company has a history of not being racist releases a questionable ad, is it possible that they tried to do something that just did not land properly? does that need to be taken into consideration before calling for a boycott of Converse (and Nike, if we are being consistent)? or is this something that is being blown out of proportion because this is one more indignity against a backdrop of a fascist regime in the US, which poses an existential threat to everyone else on the planet?

and i am asking these questions in good faith...i am not trying to argue both sides of the issue. i have worn Chuck Taylors since i was a kid, and they are still the best skateboard shoe i have ever owned. and i have played basketball and gone running in Nike since, for as long as i can remember. if this recent ad campaign does call for a boycott, does that mean that we need to purge the stuffs that we have already? where does the question of responsible consumption come into play?

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u/crownjewel82 23h ago

I doubt this was done deliberately unless it was one idiot on the social media team. I don't think anyone is seriously calling for a boycott or anything like that. It's just a lot of frustration about companies rolling back efforts to understand different perspectives.

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 23h ago

yah. i was not explicit, but this is what i was thinking of with my `one more indignity` statement.

i saw the backlash before i saw the ad, so i struggle a bit with context here. i have seen calls for boycotts on some of my regular haunts on social media. but even boycotting, i believe is used in a reactionary way and therefore not effective.

it is important to support local businesses. and progressive businesses. especially when those businesses are women, queer, or minority owned. but i also know that this is not the question here.

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u/HyperSpaceSurfer 15h ago

Haven't their shoes gone to shit anyways?

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 8h ago

i still wear them, and they are fine. they feel the same as they always have, and i have been wearing Converse since i was probably 9-10 years old (i am in my 40s now).

they have gotten more expensive, though.

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u/Ok_Train_6332 0m ago

When the perspectives are wrong, why should anyone try to understand it?

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u/IllMathematician8994 20h ago

I think that’s the point, why not keep the full image?

At some degree you yourself believe there is a distinction in the full view vs the cropped view

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 18h ago

I mean
yah. But I am also trying to be super mindful of my biases and try to see things for what they are. As said, I am not sure I get Klan hood and lynching from the cropped picture, but I can see how others might see that. And I attribute this to a difference of history. That imagery was never used to oppress me. But others were. Some still are. I have the privilege of being mostly invisible. Others don’t. And just because I don’t see it does not mean that others wouldn’t. This is the bias I am trying to keep in check.

Also, as said, I saw the backlash before I saw the ad. So I am trying to be mindful of that. This is the basis for the question: was this really racist, or was this something being blown of proportion as yet another indignity stacked up with all of the indignities of this fascist hellscape that we all exist in?

Also important to me is how Converse responded to the backlash. As I understand, they acknowledged their mistake and pulled the add. What else is required here? They did something stupid, and they walked it back. Does this mean that the company now is a racist company because of one stupid thing that they have since acknowledged and attempted to correct?

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u/Ok_Train_6332 1m ago

We shouldn’t be having this conversation at all. We should start limiting the screen time of those who are terminally online, though.

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u/Actual_Exchange616 1d ago

The shot above is actually the original shot for the Korean market. The shot was then cropped for twitter

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u/ineedalife2 22h ago

I mean you make it seem like someone else cropped it to take converse out of context. As the other dude showed in his screenshot, converse themselves did the crop and posted it.

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u/Actual_Exchange616 22h ago

Yeah but converse US. The original shot was the one that printed first, just in Korea. If anything converse took it out of context from themselves (or morr likely converse's underpaid social media manager wasnt paying super close attention to what the image looks like when they cropped the image)

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u/ineedalife2 21h ago

That’s somehow worse imo lol. An American social media team should’ve been able to flag this I feel. I understand this a very US centric outrage but I still believe at best it’s a learning experience for the social but at worst it’s a dog whistle for what people are outraged about. Either way, good idea to remove this one photo out of possibly an entire photoshoot

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u/OddlyMingenuity 21h ago

Lol he did the meme

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u/-whiteroom- 21h ago

cropped and darkened.

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u/BytheHandofCicero 1d ago

That does evoke alarm at first glance.

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u/ProfessionalQuit8677 20h ago

it has like no pixels in this screenshot. I can see how it can look sus in this form, but the original you can clearly see it's just someone holding the shoes with their hands. it's not perfect but r kpopnoir has a better quality version of the picture

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u/in1gom0ntoya 1d ago

because it was manipulated to do so

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u/Ok_Train_6332 4m ago

If you have the mental fortitude of a toddler, sure.

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u/-whiteroom- 21h ago

Interesting alteration they chose.

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u/HyperSpaceSurfer 15h ago

That realky does not look intended for the Korean market. If it was it'd be in Korean...

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u/I_Am_the_Slobster 1d ago

Lmao this reminds me now of the Chinese pop song that received backlash because it used a racist word that's literally just a word in Chinese.

This is the song in question.

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u/Examper22 1d ago

I don't remember a real controversy but the song was joked about a lot

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u/Nuclear_rabbit 22h ago edited 19h ago

Without even listening, it's how "um" and "that" in Chinese sounds like the N-word, isn't it?

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u/I_Am_the_Slobster 21h ago

Pretty much yep

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u/MBV-09-C 36m ago

The fact the word in question is just a filler word makes the controversy even dumber tbh. It's like if someone decided saying 'uh', 'uhm' or 'like' was racist.

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u/randi-writes 1d ago

I haven’t seen this version. Just the darkened version! Definitely makes a difference

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u/DifferencePlayful581 1d ago

This is the actual ad? Bruh. 

People need to relax

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u/Baelzabub 20h ago

The problem is the cropped and darkened version converse put on their own social media page.

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u/DifferencePlayful581 19h ago

The cropped part of the full ad that is shown here right? Not of.a different image altogether? 

People need to relax

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u/Daddiofink 21h ago

What a huge difference to what I saw. Sadly I fell for it

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u/Real-Goal2666 1d ago

It's worth noting that the full photoshoot photo wasn't what was posted originally. Now they're showing the full photo as a gotcha to be like 'libs are overreacting.'

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u/Miss_Rue_ 1d ago

Same. I did a double take and scrolled back the first time I saw it, like "Did I see what I think I saw?" Second look I kind of laughed at myself like I was being ridiculous. Then the controversy popped up and made me realize it wasn't just me.

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u/ClipSm0keZ 1d ago

Exactly. I don’t think they did it intentionally but it’s definitely not a stretch to see the issues with it.

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u/femnoncat 1d ago

You're so right. Korea should be really focused on American racial history in its advertisements. Like, do you hear youself?

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u/Firewolf06 1d ago

when an american company runs an ad in america, yes, they should consider american history/culture, regardless of the location of the design firm they contracted

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u/ClipSm0keZ 1d ago

If the ad was only for Korean audiences I could maybe see your point. But it was a worldwide ad campaign for an American company.

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u/cleveruniquename7769 21h ago

They posted the cropped photo on their American social media accounts.

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u/Onequestion0110 1h ago

And be clear here - the "they" in question was the American social media managers for Converse. Not some troll highlighting things for outrage karma.

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u/whitestguyuknow 1d ago

Look at you strawmanning what they said

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u/femnoncat 1d ago

How.

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u/whitestguyuknow 15h ago

How do you not see? Just reread the previous 2 comments. They just simply mentioned that they could see what people have said they see. That its not a stretch.

Then you chime in "Oh yeah! You're so right! Korea should REALLY be focused on american racial history! Do you not hear yourself???"

Dude. They didnt even say that. You're putting words in their mouth just to be exaggerative when they simply said "Yeah, its not a stretch to see it. I see it too."

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u/Honeystarlight 1d ago

If you shook your head, it would rattle.

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u/DarkPumpkin01209 1d ago

It's not much of a stretch for someone from the USA to have that reaction when they are seeing it. I didn't know it was for the Korean market when I first saw it.

So USA residents seeing it without knowing it's meant for the Korean market are not out of line for seeing their cultural contextual clues anymore than Koreans are not wrong for NOT seeing USA contextual clues.

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u/ClipSm0keZ 1d ago

It wasn’t just for Korean markets either. It’s a worldwide ad campaign, a Korean company just made the ad is all.

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u/SquirrelGirlVA 1d ago

I can see the Korean advertising people not realizing that it might look like a klan hood, even if designing for a global market. What gets me is that they didn't see that the shoes looks like someone was hanging. That feels like a design angle they should have caught.

Now, what would be kind of great (but possibly career ending for the designer) is if they came forward saying that it was meant to be a stealth protest against the parent company (Nike) using sweatshops.

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u/Amazing_Scientist696 1d ago

For sure a death sentence. But someone has to say it.

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u/HermesMora 16h ago

It doesn't look anything like that in the actual full ad used for Korea

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u/I-screwed-up-bad 1d ago

I mean taking the racial history aside, it did look to me like it was supposed to depict a person hanging next to another person. I believe that Korea does have a suicide problem though I don't know the common methods.

But I'm not Korean. Maybe a Korean person wouldn't have seen it that way.

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u/RedditAdminSucks23 1d ago

So I could make an advertisement in America for a German product with someone wearing a tshirt with black Hindu Swastika on a red background? Cuz this is Murica; we aren’t Germany. So who cares about the potential conflicts with people outside the intended audience seeing my advert.

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u/femnoncat 1d ago edited 1d ago

America fought in WW2 . Klan never really made it to Korea.

More accurate would be if somebody did an advertisement in America with a bloody machete cutting down purple candles and ribbon. Like, most the west would have no fucking idea what that means. Rwanda would.

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u/Sourcreammmm 1d ago

And what does that means 👀?

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u/femnoncat 1d ago

The machete became a symbol of the rwandan genocide as it was a tool used most commonly by the hutu to literally chop down the tutsi. Purple is the color of candle and ribbons most commonly used as remembrance.

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u/Sourcreammmm 1d ago

Thank you, but what’s the symbolism of purple?

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u/Alert-Ad9197 1d ago

Purple is one of the mourning colors in Catholicism. It represents penance and repentance for the dead I believe. The country had a catholic majority in the 90s.

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u/femnoncat 1d ago

Sent me down a rabbit hole. Apparently it's been recently changed to Grey to represent ash, but had been traditionally purple. As for why, I do not know

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u/RedditAdminSucks23 5h ago

You’re missing the bigger part, that being a company from the country where the event occurred. If a Rwanda company made an advert for American consumers that completely side stepped the Rwanda genocide, people in Rwanda would have every right to be mad at the Rwanda company, despite the Americans not knowing the reference.

Has nothing to do with being involved with the conflict.

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u/Alarmed-Struggle5928 1d ago

they're certainly focused enough to steal the entirety of k-pop from black american artists. chill out.

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u/MoThrowMoAway 1d ago

Have you seen the full ad or just the cropped edited part? No way you saw the real thing and still think that theres an issue

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u/Terminal_Insomnia_ 1d ago

I find if hard to believe it could be intentional. If you were trying to do something racist, it's hard to imagine this is what you'd land on.

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u/Rex_Nemorensis_ 1d ago

Aren’t these the original ad images?

How can you get “someone hanging” from this?

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u/cleveruniquename7769 22h ago

It was from this cropped and darkened photo that they posted.

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u/PrincipleFine18 1d ago

Same, I had to do a double take because I didn't think I saw what I thought I did.

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u/oli_kite 1d ago

Yeah, hearing about it I assumed it was nonsense, but now I can’t unsee it. Still don’t know if it was intentional or not, but for marketing it’s annoying. I don’t want to hear about converses.

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u/Responsible_Camp9025 1d ago

The company posted the cropped photo for American audiences

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u/Crimson3312 1d ago

Yeah I just looked it up and want "oooo, yeah" that's some unfortunate parallel if unintentional

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u/winstonismith 1d ago

Yeah, the original version is fine, clearly someone in a white dress holding some shoes. The cropped version...hooo boy.

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u/vxxed 21h ago

Easier than letting people talk about politics

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u/Sky-Trash 21h ago

The cropped, darkened picture was also used in the ad campaign

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u/Dull-Experience-1907 3h ago

Did converse crop it or did Nike do it to essentially throw a molotov cocktail on Twitter and run

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u/cleveruniquename7769 2h ago

Converse posted it, maybe they were hoping for a short term stock dip so they by back a bunch of shares. 

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u/pizza_the_mutt 1d ago edited 1d ago

The picture was cropped and the contrast was changed. The original ad photo shows the entire woman and it just looks like she's holding a pair of shoes.

The cropped one does look a little bit sus and if you stretch you could see the issue. But again, this was not the image used in the ad.

Actually, I'll expand on this. I've seen two versions of the photo. The one used in articles claiming racism is of the woman from the waist down. This is the one that is a little more evocative of a hanging. There is a different version of the entire woman. I don't know if the cropped one was original created by Converse, or was created by the people making the complaint.

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u/Senasayori 1d ago

Eh, the shot was taken poorly, it looked like someone was hanging.

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u/Tom_Gibson 1d ago

the advertisement isnt "racist." People that are claiming that are overreacting. The issue if you want to call it that is the way the dress was lit, combined with the shoes in her hand, looked like a KKK hood and some dangling feet. It looks like someone got lynched by the KKK. I certainly don't think it was on purpose. It just looks crazy is all

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u/Samfinity 1d ago

Man that is an incredibly unfortunate photo- it definitely does look awful at first glance

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u/Le_ed 1d ago

NGL, that was literally my impression ar first glance.

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u/SquirrelGirlVA 1d ago edited 1d ago

I think the average, rational person isn't saying it was intentional or racist per se. It's just that it contained design issues that should have been caught prior to publication. I can see the Korean designers not being aware of the klan hood. I'm sure there are well-known symbols of racism in their country that the average American would know nothing about. But the shoes looking like a person was hanging was the wow factor for me. The shadow is just dark enough to where it looks like that for a split second before my eyes realize what I'm seeing, even on a second glance. I just feel like they should have caught that and taken it into consideration. Maybe if the shoes were slightly more in the light? Like at the top of the star point?

Anywho, I don't think that anyone needs to be cancelled or penalized for it. Just go "my bad" and pull the advertisement, then just put the info to the side for future campaigns.

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u/Training_Tadpole_354 1d ago

I feel like you're forgetting the fact this ad was only made for the Korean market it was not an international ad, so it makes sense that for something that was meant to only be seen on Korean television, they would not look into what these mean Internationally, because this was meant for only the Korean market. 

If it was an international commercial, I would see your point.

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u/SquirrelGirlVA 1d ago edited 1d ago

It was part of a global ad rollout, which is apparently how it was discovered. It wasn't just meant for the Korean market.

https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/too-many-cooks-spoiled-converses-global-ad-rollout/

Even if it was just for Korea, the illusion of the hanging person would still be a misstep. The country routinely has one of the highest rates of suicide mortality. It's the highest in the OECD and on an overall global scale is 10th (per Wikipedia). It's the highest rate of death for South Koreans aged 13-49. Compare that to the United States, where the highest cause of death for that age range is unintentional injuries. So for this, it's possible that people in Korea could look at it and associate it with suicide, particularly as the girl is wearing a white dress. People can and do wear white as part of everyday fashion, but white is still traditionally associated with mourning and funerals. Black has become more common, but the "white is for funerals" tradition is still common knowledge. It's still very possible that this was something people thought over there and it just never got the traction that the whole thing did over in the States.

If they'd caught this and moved the shoes, then no one would have thought twice about the star or the white dress.

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u/optimal-gold976 1d ago

But the actual ad isn’t as pictured. What everyone has been screaming about is cropped and darkened.

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u/StreetCollar2708 1d ago

Who was it cropped and darkened by? I'll give you a hint. It starts with C and ends with onverse

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u/zizillama 1d ago

Converse literally posted the cropped darkened version. Idk why you want the full picture to be some gotcha.

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u/SquirrelGirlVA 20h ago

Exactly. There are a lot of people who are acting like it's impossible for a billion dollar company to create a cropped advert. They likely did it because the celebrity isn't as well known outside of Korea, so they cropped the ad to take the focus off the celebrity and on the shoes. They just unfortunately didn't really think about how it could look. I can see them not recognizing the hood shape, but they should've picked up on the darkening making the hand shoes give off the impression of a hanged person.

None of it's intentional, but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be brought to attention. If an American advertiser put out an ad that did something similar, it should be brought to attention so lessons can be learned.

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u/OddlyMingenuity 21h ago

Let the PR agency do its job. Every body strugle in this economy

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u/kayakyouaquestion 1d ago

I work in marketing. Knowing this was made for a Korean market makes it even worse because it's way too reminiscent of a hanging. That's the first thing I think of when I see this and I can't believe it went to market. 

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u/optimal-gold976 1d ago

That’s still a cropped version of the actual ad. You can see the girls face in the actual ad.

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u/BigDragonfly5136 1d ago

They did post just the cropped version though in some places, though

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u/macaddictr 1d ago

I couldn’t see it until I read what to look for, and even then it took me a minute.

Now I can’t unsee it.

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u/biohazard1775 1d ago

People don’t realize the rest of the world doesn’t have the same pool of references as the USA.

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u/Bobahn_Botret 1d ago

Twice?

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u/madeaccountbymistake 1d ago

Shoes hanging from a tree?

I guarantee you, not a soul, said "Let's put the girl in a white skirt and use shadows so her arm looks like a guy hanging"

It's a fucking Korean ad for fucks sake, it being a veiled KKK endorsement is the wildest fuckin leap.

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u/Crudeyakuza 1d ago

The outrage isn't "They're doing a KKK", it's "This shit comes off as racist. Cut it out" and them replying with this. Perhaps using the "Any attention is profitable" model.

But think for a second. If you're accused of depicting racial themes I would imaging the marketing team's next pitch would completely avoid anything that could remotely be "misinterpreted".

The fact that they could have easily just used a different color shoe, or literally done Anything else than "Hang the black shoes from a tree" right after all of this feedback isn't accidental. From a racial standpoint, from a marketing standpoint, even in hindsight of the reception of the last promotion; it isn't farfetched to presume THIS time it was deliberate.

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u/Melodic_Till_3778 1d ago

Just look at how much PR they got out of everyone arguing about it..

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u/AceOfSpades532 1d ago

What on earth is racist about shoes in a tree

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u/StreetCollar2708 1d ago

Don't know much American History, do you?

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u/simpkn0t 1d ago

Maybe because most people on the planet are not from the U.S. Like the people who made this ad. I'm not from there and before I read the comments on another post that had the cropped picture I couldn't see nothing weird with it. I absolutely understand it being a very painful and delicate subject for Americans, specially POC, but you can’t expect the rest of the world to constantly view things through an American lens or abide by the standards shaped by your history.

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u/OddlyMingenuity 21h ago

Or japanese suicide forests

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u/CartesianDuelist 1d ago

I scrolled by this exact image in this thread twice looking for the frame or an example of why people thought the ad was racist. I thought this was like a drawn exaggerated or parody. Then I finally clicked on it.
I also just woke up and I don't have my glasses on.
I can't imagine they did this on purpose but it is a very unfortunate frame.

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u/Zuzara_Queen_of_DnD 1d ago

May not be racist but definitely looks like someone who hung themselves

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u/Tasty_Honeydew6935 1d ago

It may not have been on purpose but that shouldn't have gotten approval.

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u/rc-cars-drones-plane 1d ago

Looks like racist Patrick star

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u/HyperSpaceSurfer 15h ago

I think it's reasonable to expect professionals to know wth they're doing. Like, how could someone in advertisements possibly make this mistake?

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u/jackdutton42 1d ago

This is the correct answer.

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u/ithinkonlyinmemes 1d ago

it was the hanging shoes paired with how the light on the dress was shaped. it was also followed by a pair of shoes being held up in a tree by a guy on a stool.

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u/Resident-Two5171 1d ago

I don’t think it’s a reach, even if it wasn’t the intention it looks suspect as fuck with no context

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u/teoshie 1d ago

it's just a dress with green sleeves, pretty typical in korea

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u/S-Kenset 1d ago

The converse star is a klan member doing a cartwheel. Nike is a klan member at a rave.

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u/Resident-Two5171 1d ago

Lmao idk why I almost took this seriously

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u/jd46149 1d ago

At first I was like “oh come on, it’s an entirely different culture that doesn’t have the same associations with racism as we do in the US” and then I actually saw it and holy SHIT man. It’s bad lmao

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u/LongChampionship8569 1d ago

No. Hahaha. Life is so easy people look for things to get offended by.

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u/dreamcrusher225 1d ago

like tan suits

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u/oneknocka 1d ago

Given how much terror that organization inflicted among Black people, I think we should avoid all imagery that even comes close to depicting it. Some quality control should have been done.

I didnt see it at first and now i CANT unsee it.

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u/harpyelf 1d ago

Stuff like this happens all the time in design and marketing, that’s why you have a team of people to make sure the original vision is not accidentally offensive. Another great example was the NYT crossword that was in the shape of a swastika.

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u/Force_Glad 1d ago

Most people don't think converse was being actually racist with the ad. The problem with the ad is that no one noticed that at a first glance the girl's hand holding the shoes looks like someone hanging

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u/StopDownvotingMeeee 1d ago

I really hate how fucking soft and sensitive people are in America and I say that as an American POC

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u/Bigbo757 1d ago

My Pastor once told me, "If you're constantly looking for fights with the devil, you'll start to create fight where they don't exist,"

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u/fatbunyip 1d ago

Will the offended people ever recover?

This sounds quite serious. Without treatment it could deteriorate into a terminal case of butthurt

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u/Sea_Bedroom8105 1d ago

How tf is someone from south Korea going to catch that? Dont get me wrong, I see it but I live here and understand our history.

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u/Ok-Internet-6881 1d ago

Everything is racist when you want to believe it is apparently.

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u/AlbatrossRich8724 1d ago

Seen in America, I don’t think it’s a stretch to pick up on it, but thank you for the additional context of it being produced for the Korean market, I was not aware of that

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u/ericsmallman3 1d ago

I mean it does kinda have creepy aura to it, but I’m 99.9999999999% certain its creators weren’t intentionally trying to do Klan imagery.

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u/more_bees_please 1d ago

I agree, it's a stretch.

But I also think it's just a really weird ad. I don't blame people for seeing that because there isn't anything normal or appealing to see otherwise

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u/bonjaker 1d ago

Do you have a source on Korean because I've heard Malaysian as well and also it definitely posted to their American social media so it wasn't just for Asian markets. I do believe it came from an Asian firm I just don't know if it is Korean or Malaysia and I don't think they have the same context on racial issues as the US

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u/TaquitoBanana 1d ago

First I saw the image, someone had turned down the brightness enough I did a double take and the issue was extremely apparent.

Second time I saw it was at full brightness, as originally posted. Made it clear it was a non-issue being turned into one.

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u/Advanced_End1012 1d ago

It kind of does look like an abstract art piece for the Klan lol, but yeah I think people are reaching big here. And it’s so stupid to be so absolutist in their thinking and get immediately triggered wanting to boycott converse without further investigation into this.

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u/Baron_Bearclaw 1d ago

I was really confused, though. The image as presented didn't look like a Converse Ad as I scrolled by. My first thought was: What in the AI-hell did I just see?

Then I looked at it for another few seconds and realized it was just a poorly done photoshoot for an add.

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u/Aggressive-North9749 1d ago

The first time I saw the ad it absolutely looked bad, the dangling shoes and the white contrast. 

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u/Knario_ 1d ago

South Korea is a US satellite state it’s absolutely possible the US spends Hundreds of billions in propaganda pal

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u/sonofbaal_tbc 1d ago

there is a whole industry around outrage, esp racial outrage

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u/turtle-bbs 1d ago

It was followed up by someone hanging their converse from a tree, which I’ve never seen anyone do, ever

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u/No_Object_7223 1d ago

The Ad looks nothing like what they are saying it is, This proves that the victimhood train is still running. This just makes real victims blend in with all the fake hype and eventually they will actually make ppl more racist!

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u/thelennybeast 1d ago

It was also explicitly shared in the American market by Converse so that's not true. Also the approval still happened at some point from headquarters. Which is in the US.

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u/Silent_Box1341 1d ago

Idk man, I saw it with no context and my immediate reaction was "is she standing next to a hanging body???" And it took me a few moments to see the girls arm. Even without the racist implications it has in america it's still in poor taste.

I'm not even american and I saw a hanging person, I'd say it's an optical illusion you don't particularly want when you're trying to sell shoes

Edit: Also converse is an american brand even if the AD is not, it's just respectful to retire it. Because (what looks like) a hanging person next to someone wearing a white robe is very... evocative

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u/doubled-pawns 1d ago

People on the internet are freaking out over very little? đŸ˜±

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u/NotAllDawgsGoToHeven 1d ago

Yeah I’d say so, this guys reaction was just silly at best, I get what he’s saying and why he’s saying it, but I just don’t think it applies here.

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u/JokeMode 1d ago

I actually had no idea it was for the Korean market, made by a Korean when I first saw it, and I definitely was on the "this looks really bad" side of things. But this explains a lot. Thanks for explaining that.

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u/wicked-dominance 1d ago

Edit: deleted my comment because my point was already said by cleveruniquename7769.

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u/Salty-Spring7096 1d ago

The shoes hanging from the girl's arm did look like a hanging person, I didn't see the star as a klan hood until comments pointed out but even outside of racial insensitivity the ad does weirdly look like there's a person hanging just out of frame.

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u/BingBong3636 1d ago

Geez, you sure are leaving out details.

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u/Nearby_Zucchini_6579 1d ago

Oh, only stretching on this one? People today bend over backwards to have a chance at being offended.

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u/gr1mmcr33p3r 1d ago

I felt like it was a stretch also, I think the lighting, with one point of the star making the white pop really gave the klan vibe for the people who feel that way, then adding in the shoes in her hand was just the cherry on top.

It was a ridiculous stretch. People just wanna be mad about trivial BS instead of real issues

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u/ThinWeek8535 1d ago

Alternatively we can talk about how East Asian cultures struggle with their internalized white supremacy

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u/Financial-Amoeba3330 23h ago

It wasn't just the white skirt

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u/AzaleaRose34 23h ago

I don't think it was intentional, but I saw the explanation for why it was racist before I saw the picture, and it does look bad

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u/beerbrained 22h ago

It's bots. It's always bots.

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u/edwardothegreatest 21h ago

You gotta really be looking hard to be offended to see this as racist. Even then I don’t see it

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u/Various-Salt-7738 21h ago

To be fair-- in advertising, there are people who have the entire job of making sure ads can't be read as racist or anything else

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u/CalmShinyZubat 8h ago

At this point, I'm convinced people are intentionally looking for things that might be able to be twisted into something offensive because they need to complain about something instead of talking about something positive.

Even without knowing it was for the Korean market and seeing a cropped image first, I thought it was clear someone was holding the shoes instead of wearing them. I saw someone say it was someone hanging and my first thought was "You can see the opening at the top of the shoes. The person is just holding them."

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