Dove have come under fire for releasing an advert on Facebook featuring a black woman turning into a white woman after supposedly using the beauty brand’s body lotion.

多芬在社交媒体Facebook上发布了一则广告：一位黑人女性使用多芬的沐浴露后肤色变成了白色。而这则广告为多芬带来了麻烦。

Critics were quick to accuse the brand of aligning use of their body cleansing product with a racial transformation, which inadvertently presents the former as “dirty” and the latter as “clean” within the context of the ad.

很快，有评论者控诉多芬把沐浴露和种族差异联系起来，广告内容无意中透漏着黑人很“脏”，白人很“干净”的意思。

Dove has since issued an apology and the incriminating video has been removed.

多芬为此发表了致歉声明，并删除了这则涉嫌歧视的视频。

“I think Dove is now clickbait fodder,” says Cui Su, an advertising course leader at London College of Communication.

伦敦传媒学院（London College of Communication）的广告课程老师崔苏（Cui Su）说：“我觉得多芬现在在炒作。”

“Has anyone actually seen the whole Dove ad or just the single image posted by a media savvy person? "More likely, the posted image and its circulation meant that the original ad was de-contextualised and distorted. It happens a lot in social media and especially with big brands," she explained.

“有人看过这则广告的完整版吗？还是只有一张深谙此道的媒体人曝出来的图片？曝出来的图片以及后续转发很可能表明，原始广告是有一个大背景的，但是现在被误解了。社交媒体里这种事情太多了，大牌尤其喜欢做这种事。”

Social media users were quick to point out that Dove were also accused of racism in 2011.

用户很快发现2011多芬曾被以种族歧视起诉。

"Modern-day racial and gender prejudices have morphed into unconscious biases, and the popular reaction to the Dove ad mirrors that," Jaywant Singh, professor of marketing at Kingston University told The Independent.

金斯顿大学（Kingston University）市场营销教授杰万特·辛格说：“今天的种族和性别歧视已经演变成了无意识的偏见，群众对多芬广告的反应就是这样。”

"On the face of it, the Dove ad comes across as racist, or more simply, as poorly executed by a culturally insensitive agency. On the other hand, the audience reactions also show that the biases are still deeply-entrenched, and in that sense the ad serves as a ‘mirror to our prejudices’," he added.

“表面上看，多芬的广告好像是有种族歧视，或者简单来说，在多芬的企业文化里这不算敏感事件。另一方面，群众的反应也体现了这样的歧视现象仍然根深蒂固，广告正好‘反映了我们的偏见’。”

Indeed, the Dove debacle is just one of many in a sea of beauty adverts that have similarly “missed the mark.”

多芬此次失误确实只是众多美体快消业广告中的一例，还有大量的广告都“事与愿违”。

Worse still was the Malaysian beauty chain, Watsons Malaysia, who sparked a furore earlier this year when they released a Malay folklore-inspired video which showed a wealthy merchant being seduced by a female voice whose face had been obviously painted black.

马来西亚的美体行业马来西亚屈臣氏情况更糟，甚至激起了民愤。今年早些时候，屈臣氏有马来人发布视频，视频中，有钱的商人被一个女性声音所引诱，这名女性的面部被人为涂成了黑色。

In the video, the woman is depicted as undesirable, with the merchant asking “where are the lights?” after seeing her face.

她的形象并不惹人喜爱，商人看到她的脸之后就问：“灯在那儿？”

Why is it that in 2017, beauty brands – large and small – continue to “miss the mark” when it comes to race?

为什么今年大大小小的美体品牌在种族问题上老是“事与愿违”呢？

"If this was a small brand would there be such a furore?" asks Singh, who questions the public's outraged response to ads which are dubbed "racist."

辛格说：“如果只是一个小品牌，也会这样激起民愤吗？”辛格对群众朝所谓“种族主义”广告发火的行为表示质疑。

"The modern-day society in general is averse to being seen as racist, which is feared more than racism itself. Once an ad has a dubious connotation, many are quick to take side, to declare their lack of racism too. Whatever happened to just not buying the product?

“今天的社会总体上抗拒被标榜为种族主义的，这种抗拒比种族歧视本身更具威慑力。一旦有广告引发了歧视联想，很多人当下就会选边站，声称自己不是种族歧视者。但是最终不过就是不买广告里卖的产品？”

"Such demonstrations are akin to wearing ethical consumerism on your sleeve. The Dove ad is perhaps wrong but is it really racist? Or has racism been taken out of the intended context to satisfy a different purpose?"

“这种民愤很像道德绑架。多芬的广告可能是有问题，但是能说它真的是在种族歧视吗？有没有可能是有人从中制造出种族歧视的意图来满足其他目的？”

Issues regarding race are particularly prevalent when it comes to the beauty industry because, as Singh explains, "these products are often consumed by an individual to signal their desired self-identity, which in turn is shaped by the society and its prejudices."

美体快消业中的种族问题尤其普遍，辛格说：“这些产品的购买者通常是为了彰显他们的高贵身份，而这种身份正是社会和社会所持有的偏见缔造的。”

（翻译：阿忙）

声明：本双语文章的中文翻译系爱思英语原创内容，转载请注明出处。中文翻译仅代表译者个人观点，仅供参考。如有不妥之处，欢迎指正。