Does anybody else find this commercial extremely annoying and borderline racist?
Can it be any worse than “I’m gellin’ like a felon” ads.
Yes and yes.
I don’t get it, what’s racist about it? Just because it’s a black family being annoying doesn’t make it racist.
I haven’t paid much attention to the commercial though, so maybe I’m missing something.
Well, it’s only borderline racist, I guess. It took me a few times to really see it (or hear it, as it were).
The grandma is the main problem. Everything she utters is straight out of the ebonics textbook: “You be tearin’ and sharin’ and rippin’ and dippin’” … “You don’t got it” …
I realize some people talk like that, but in the context of a pizza commercial it’s just demeaning and over-the-top, IMO.
Also, if you read the closed captioning during the commercial, it corrects the grammar: “You’ll be ripping and dipping.” What the hell is that?
I’m not seeing the racism; the grandmother is being a bit too jive with the “rippin’ and dippin’” but a script employing urban African American speech patterns is not in itself racist, IMO. The exaggerated intonation, the dropped g’s, and the rhyming are just elements of signifying, a venerable linguistic tradition in African American culture.
Sure, I understand the validity of African-American speech patterns (and appreciate the link, by the way).
But we’re using it to sell pizza now? I don’t know; it just seems so un-genuine.
is it online somewhere? I’ve not seen it.
Yeah, I hate it when those commercials get so stereotypcial and racist. All those white bankers in pinstriped suits speaking with proper grammar, just to try to sell me mutual funds. How dare they!
LOL - ungenuine in advertising? Who woulda thought?
Heaven forbid then that you should call the store and listen to the ob hold comercial with all the silly accents and dumb jokes.
Cardinal that a 9.9 for sarcasm!
I haven’t seen it. Whats it advertising? As in what special? I hated the P’zone one, and the DVD one made me crazy.
Arachnidlove
[sub] deliver driver for Pizza Hut [/sub]
Most annoying!
OK, did anyone else think that the guy in the commercial who wasn’t rippin’ and dippin’ correctly looked like a grown-up Urkel?
If being an annoying black family was racist, then every show on UPN would be considered that.
I’ve seen it about a zillion times (Pizza Hut is based here). I didn’t find it racist at all. Just a nice family sitting down for a little rippin’ and dippin’.
When I saw this thread title I thought it was going to be a rant about another commercial that made the husband of the family the object of the traditional ridicule. Word.
It’s not as bad as using John Lennon’s song “Instant Karma” to sell sneakers. The proper term is sell-out bullshit, but unfortunately pre-packaged idiocy seems to work pretty well when advertising to the genuine populace.
The reduction of urban speech, music, and culture into cheap marketing ploys is in large part sad and tragic. However, on the other hand it is an incredible testament to the creative talents of the founders of the genre. Hip-Hop (“DJ-ing, MC-ing, Graffiti Art, Breaking and the Philosophies” as KRS-1 puts it) originated in the poverty stricken Bronx. This was an area infected with tremendous poverty and hardship. As a result of unethical lending practices, banks would create poor neighborhoods consisting of specific ethnic groups. They would only loan money to members of certain groups if the lendees were buying houses in certain areas. So a Polish guy couldn’t get a loan unless he was buying a house in the neighborhood the bank had deemed a Polish hood. Blacks, Irish, Hispanics: they all got pushed into their own neighborhoods as a result of a (now illegal) practice called redlining. Banks would send scouts to the neighborhoods who would see what kind of residents made up the population. As few as 2 black people on a block was enough to get the block redlined. Enough redlined blocks and your whole neighborhood was outlined on a city map at the bank and declared a “insert ethnic group” neighborhood.
This despicable practice ultimately resulted in the creation of poverty-ridden crime-stricken ghettos. The problems for these people were further compounded by the ill-fated (if well intended) www.mi.vt.edu/Research/PDFs/teaford.pdf+%22failure+of+urban+renewal%22+%22new+york%22+%22ghetto%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8]Urban Renewal projects which often ended up ripping down tons of buildings in minority neighborhoods, and then never building the replacement structures that had been planned (for whatever reason - funding, resources, manpower, apathy). The result was a landscape dotted heavily with abandoned empty lots filled with debris. Prejudices in hiring practices also frequently led to the minorities getting paid low wages in low-end jobs. As if the deck wasn’t already stacked against them, the building of the Cross-Bronx expressway left in its aftermath dust, fumes, and the deafening roar of steady heavy traffic, further isolating Bronx neighborhoods and leading to rapid neighborhood change in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. As a result of declining property values it became more profitable for building owners to burn their property to the ground because they could get more from insurance then from the sale of the building. Insurance fraud arson was widespread and further devestated the area.
Basically, the minorities in the Bronx (particularly black people) got fucked. They got fucked in regards to housing, in regards to segregation, in regards to urban blight, in regards to employment, and in regards to general bigotry. Considering all of this, it is absolutely awe inspiring that such a powerful music and culture was conceived by folks residing smack dab in the heart of such adverse living conditions. A music, language, and culture born of jaded, angry, and repressed mentalities (read: realistic mentalities). It is even more incredible that these poverty stricken people channel this adversity into a music and culture which has become a multi-billion dollar global industry. Disco is history, but hip-hop is here to stay.
To sum up, it is, in a way, the ultimate American dream. No matter how bad your lot in life, no matter how shitty your hand, if you rise up and create something with value, even the poor and repressed have the chance to rise up and be hugely successful. Governmental, business, and social standards were all obstacles that hip-hop pole-vaulted over. So it is inspiring, it is admirable, and there is a particularly interesting (and largely shameful) lesson that can be taken from this particular bit of US history.
Unfortunately, with the success of anything comes commercialization. Corporations swoop in to capitalize on popular culture to market their products to the members of that culture. This tends to result in people who don’t get the culture portraying it in ways that seem foolish or “borderline racist”. White copywriters pen commercials to appeal to the hip-hop demographic, and most times it looks foolish. We are given the gift of the wonderful art/culture of hip-hop, but as a result we see DJ’s and rappers in Burger King and Mountain Dew commercials. The selling out seems to cheapen the art, but I don’t see that it is avoidable. Success will be copied, jacked, diluted, and whored if someone thinks they can make a buck. It’s all part of capitalism. The same system that allows the underdog to have a shot at the bigtime also guarantees the commercialization and imitation of anything that achieves bigtime success.
A friend of mine (a white guy) got cast in a Macy’s commercial. The script had the main character saying lines like “New Yizzork” and “That’s how we do it at 262 maple, yo!” to a friend. At the audition my friend was paired with a black scene partner. They were given the sides (sections of the script) and told to take a few minutes. They just kind of assumed that the black guy would say those lines and that’s how they went over it until they got called in. When they started they were immediately stopped. One of the panel of casting directors (a black guy with dreadlocks) said “No, no, no. I want YOU to say those lines.” to my friend. The urban speech was not supposed to be delivered by a ghetto fabulous looking black kid, but rather by a preppy looking upstate white kid. The commercial cracks me up because it’s a friend of mine, but it is really just as bad as those Pizza Hut commercials (if not worse). Oh well, whattayagonna do. Gotta take the bad with the good sometimes.
Oh, and if anyone needs any help getting involved in this whole hip-hop thing just go to Discover Hip-Hop for all your poser needs.
DaLovin’ Dj
Sorry about the broken link.
Offensive?
Go get a sugar rush going, you’ll feel better… for a while, then you’ll feel really sick and be all sticky from the dippin’.
They should talk exactly like sterotypical white people. Then they wouldn’t be racist.