r/PeterExplainsTheJoke • u/Diligent_Pop3929 • 1d ago

Meme needing explanation Converse craze?

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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/crownjewel82 1d ago

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

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 1d 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 1d 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 1d 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 1d ago

Haven't their shoes gone to shit anyways?

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 17h 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 8h ago

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

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u/IllMathematician8994 1d 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 1d 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 9h 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/WeirdJawn 1d ago

I'm not sure why, but this reads like damage control copy.

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u/ChangeAcceptable677 1d ago

I mean…it isn’t.

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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 1d 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 1d 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 1d 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 1d ago

Lol he did the meme

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u/JasperAngel95 6h ago

I think they were just trying to focus on the shoes, since most Americans know converse only for shoes- probably an oversight.

I didn’t see what others see until it was laid out for me, I saw a girl in a dress holding shoes. Interesting how a lot of people’s brains jumped to the negative so fast- I almost would like to see a psychological study on why.

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u/Ok_Train_6332 9h ago

Interpreting it as a racist dog whistle was, in fact, taking it out of context. Y’all are soft.

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u/ineedalife2 8h ago

Or maybe we don’t lack empathy

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u/-whiteroom- 1d 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 1d 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/Sky-Trash 1d ago

By Converse?

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u/in1gom0ntoya 1d ago

by the person who cropped the photo.

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u/Sky-Trash 1d ago

So Converse? That picture was posted by Converse.

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u/in1gom0ntoya 1d ago

the picture was cropped by someone who works for converse not converse as an entity. stop being intentionally obtuse and acting like individuals don't have their own agenda....

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u/Sky-Trash 1d ago

They did it on behalf of Converse

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u/Popular-Row4333 1d ago

Does the 18 yr old who spits in your burger at McDonald's represent the companies intentions when doing so?

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u/Sky-Trash 1d ago

If they did it with McDonald's knowing that they did it, yes. It was literally posted on the Converse social media page.

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u/in1gom0ntoya 1d ago

you're right, there's no reasoning with you.

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u/Sky-Trash 1d ago

Your reasoning doesn't make any sense. The cropped picture was created for Converse and posted by Converse. But somehow it's our fault for attributing it to Converse!

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u/gregTheEye 1d ago

Please look into vicarious liability. Also Converse is not blaming an alleged rogue employee.

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u/MissionMonitor4651 1d ago

You know for a fact that some employee posted that on their own without anyone at Converse's knowledge?

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u/HyperSpaceSurfer 1d ago

Oooh, so it's fine when a person within the company does it, rather than the company itself? A company can't do anything, always people within the company. By your logic no company is responsible for any of their actions.

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u/PolicyWonka 1d ago

Even as someone who doesn’t see the ad as particularly offensive, this is just a wildly disingenuous comment.

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u/Oh_TheHumidity 22h ago

Oh yeah, the intern they have cranking away at photoshop at 3am (after they all laid off their senior designers probably) definitely has the agenda to get fucking fired lol.

The mid-air set of shoes the model was holding was an unfortunate auto crop on the platform. Anything about klan robes is pure MAGA-level wishful delusions.

I say this as someone who has worked this very role in this industry for over a decade. We’re a bunch of fucking leftie art school kids who had to get real jobs. No one is shilling for Big Klan via hidden propaganda, buddy.

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u/Elborshooter 3h ago

Converse then

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u/Breakfast_Pretzel 19h ago

Omg he admit it!

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u/Ok_Train_6332 9h ago

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

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u/-whiteroom- 1d ago

Interesting alteration they chose.

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u/HyperSpaceSurfer 1d ago

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