When it comes to beauty advertising, there are certain things all brands should avoid.

The most obvious would be to use a black person to depict feeling dirty and a white person to symbolise feeling clean.

That’s just common sense.

No one in their right mind would equate blackness with dirt…oh wait, apart from Dove’s marketing team.


Yep, Dove – the most loving of soap brands – has had to apologise for their latest Facebook ad campaign which showed a beautiful black woman peeling off her T-shirt to reveal the white woman underneath her skin, brought out thanks to some Dove lotion.

An image we recently posted on Facebook missed the mark in representing women of color thoughtfully. We deeply regret the offense it caused. — Dove (@Dove) October 7, 2017

And it didn’t take long for Twitter to get hold of it and start calling them out on what is possibly one of the worst ads of the year.

Dove apologised for 'racist' Facebook advert showing a black woman turning white after using @Dove lotion. pic.twitter.com/NGXyhnGuBZ — Habeeb Akande (@Habeeb_Akande) October 8, 2017

Not being funny but if a lotion literally stripped me of my skin colour, I’d be worried that it contained some kind of acid.



But jokes aside, who the hell thought this was a good idea?

Dove marketing execs approving that racist ad pic.twitter.com/JNu0zvha9w — Laura Dowrich (@ldowrich) October 8, 2017

WAIT WAIT WAIT!!! HOW DID THIS LEAVE THE WHITEBOARD?!?! pic.twitter.com/3JaPKoMOPZ — ✨Odion ?? (@bodaciousbobo) October 8, 2017

And it’s not the first time that the brand has been accused of using blackness as an undesirable skin tone in their campaigns

You have done it in the past.? pic.twitter.com/qaGG10bePw — Nonhlanhla Mabhena (@N0n0zA) October 7, 2017

So, Dove, forgive people if they’re not quite ready to accept your apologies

@Dove once again is taking us for a big MSUNU, thinking that "apologizing"for what they truly believe makes it better. Tsek!! pic.twitter.com/Y2UWsInA6o — Chesty (@SiviweT) October 8, 2017

Come back to us once you’ve fired whichever melon is approving this nonsense.

MORE: It’s quite racist to call your mixed race friends black if they don’t identify as such

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