Protesting is in.
It’s all the fun of Coachella but with picket signs. Rather, that’s what Pepsi’s newest ad would lead you to believe.
The commercial, which was pulled shortly after its release, featured Kendall Jenner in the midst of a photoshoot when she decided on a whim to join a protest that was happening nearby. Fist bumps and head nods of approval proceed to the climax, when she steps out of the crowd and approaches a police officer to hand him a Pepsi. The crowd goes wild. All is well, the end.
If you give the commercial a mere once-over, the basic concept is beautiful. It’s an ad about unity, and it shows a protest that includes lots of diverse identities, but it feels like that’s where the critical thinking stopped, at that most basic level.
It left many wondering whether Pepsi consulted with any people of color or people who actually have to protest for their rights before making this ad. The commercial was clearly meant, first and foremost, to benefit Pepsi. The company sought to capitalize on the current social climate by showing black, brown and queer bodies. They met their diversity standards, and in the process, tokenized marginalized identities to sell their soda.
In the ad, Kendall must become less glamourous and more down to earth in order to join the protest. The camera cuts to shots of her removing her makeup and wig before joining the protest — but not before tossing her leftover wig to the black woman assisting her. This so ironically mirrors real life that one wonders if it was purposeful.
Black women and women of color are always treated as if all they deserve is leftovers. If there aren’t men telling them to put race first, then it’s white women proclaiming, “We’re all just women. Why do you have to bring race into everything?”
Intersectionality matters, especially when outspoken white women say that women make 78 cents for every man’s dollar — when women of color make only 59 cents to a white man's dollar, according to a recent study by the Economic Policy Institute. Or that women got the right to vote in 1920, but black women couldn’t vote until 1965. Intersectionality matters because women of color are black and brown and women all at the same time, and they protest in defense of those identities all at once.
However, the Kardashian-Jenner clan doesn’t typically protest at all. Actually, they come under fire regularly for everything from cultural appropriation to ableism and transphobia. While Kendall is arguably the least offensive Jenner, she still represents a lot of privilege — the privilege of being white and rich and largely protected from the ills of society that marginalized people deal with every day. By centering the ad around Jenner, Pepsi elevates and reinforces privilege by structuring the narrative around someone most protesters can’t relate to.
The most blatant example of Pepsi’s oversight is that a black woman or any person of color often cannot approach police in a standoff without incurring violence. To imply that a Pepsi could fix this is to say that protestors can do something to prevent the violence inflicted upon them.
They can’t.
There have been multiple videos throughout history that demonstrate how protesters only have to be present and breathing to warrant violence. Even Martin Luther King, the pillar of American nonviolence, was affected by police brutality.
This isn’t to say that Jenner should have been tackled in the ad, or sprayed with a hose for the sake of accuracy, but that this commercial shouldn’t have been done in the first place. It is extremely obtuse and insensitive to try to monetize our current socio-political landscape, especially in such a frivolous manner.
