A Christmas-themed television commercial by Chowking aired on the 10th of November 2007. The 45-second commercial features the song Sana Ngayong Pasko sung by a young boy. The short Chowking advertisement shows us a family in the middle of their Christmas eve celebration and reunion. A young boy, by the name of Noel, was anticipating the arrival of his father, also named Noel, who appeared to be working overseas. It was hinted that the father and son have not met at least once yet. The father was shown looking at pictures of his son on his way to their house and his friend commented, “Sa wakas, makikita mo na rin ang anak mo (Finally, you’re going to meet your son).” Once the father finally arrived at the house, the mother exclaimed his name, which caught the son’s attention. Followed after the reunion of the spouses, the son was then peeking from behind the mother saying, “Noel did po pangalan niyo? (Is Noel also your name?). The father smiled at his son’s words and then held his son in his arms. The words “Ngayong Pasko, mag Salo salo” then ended the commercial. I believe that this media form tells us a very simple message – that the Filipino family value each member very much. It tells us that the most important thing in Christmas are not the gifts, not the food, not the surprise, but the companionship. It also tells us the reality and lifestyles of an average Filipino household – the busy parents that are usually away from their homes, spending less time with their family, just to support their standards of living. There is also the hidden meaning of the Filipino family understanding each other more and knowing each other better only during events like Christmas. Events like these for the Filipinos are treated with much expectations, making it more special than other events.
Since this is a commercial by Chowking, the immediate target audience are families, most particularly, the Filipino familes. Chowking is promoting their Salo-salo promo which is intended to ride along reunions and gatherings like Christmas and the obvious targets would either be a group of friends, colleagues, and families. In line with this, it empowers families who are complete during Christmas. Since it utilized ethos in getting the attention of the viewers/consumers, it left a sympathetic and an empathetic impression. Even though they used red herring as a fallacy by dodging the issue of Chowking’s Salo-salo promo and attacked on the family issue instead, it still left a huge emotional impact to the viewers that made the commercial worth anticipating and leaving the notion that trying out Chowking’s Salo-salo promo would make you remember about the said ad. Rather, it just makes you want to try availing the promo because of how it made the family come together! Despite not really making any sense. It shows us the message that Chowking will help a family come together, and not having Chowking will not make a family come together.
I found this advertisement really interesting. It actually made me tear up a bit because of how cute and touching the storyline was. Despite knowing the intentions behind the ad, I still cannot help but feel empathetic towards the story. It left me questioning what would happen next. Will the father leave again? Did the son realize why the man was also named Noel? How is Chowking related to this meeting? Does it really need to be related? It is very loose-ended and maybe asking Chowking or the client why they made the storyline such would help. But then again, it is very captivating. Instances like this really do occur in our society today. With the financial standing of the families and the Philippines, it would really be inevitable to survive with only the Philippine’s pay. Christmas will only be the time of the year when they will finally let all their worries go – the only time of the year to be truly happy with one’s family. Hopefully this Christmas, people would not forget what the most important thing really is.
An infographic illustration, “Social Media Election” has been posted in OpenSite.org last October 10, 2012. This infographic about the boom of social media and its effect on the U.S. elections is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. From my understanding, since this is an infograph about social media and elections, the intended target audience would then be the internet users, particularly internet users who use mainstream social networking sites; voters, particularly the U.S. voters; and a mix of both internet users and voters. Although it is not quite stated, this can also be useful to the politicians/individuals who are planning on running as well to give them an idea on what the effects and how powerful the internet is today.
This illustration involves a vertical orientation in making its points. Its points are mostly statistical and it was designed in a way that would remind us, no, rather, leave us with the impression that we are using a social networking site. The points are designed in a twitter-ish, facebook-ish, safari-ish and youtube-ish way. It looks really appealing and is easy to understand given that it mostly shows statistics on how the social media affected the recent elections U.S. Elections. Quoted from the OpenSite, “However, many are starting to wonder if social media is becoming less a reporter of political races and more of a predictor of the results. In Senate races, the candidate with more Facebook friends than his or her opponent has won 81% of the time. And one email sent to 60 million Facebook users prompted an additional 340,000 people to vote in the 2010 election. This infographic illustrates just how politics and social media are affecting each other.”
We can say that this media form is showing us the lifestyle of the technology world today – especially with the boom of social media now affecting even to the point of predicting and controlling elections. Cyberspace is the only domain in the entire world where there is no concrete ruling over something. We are all free to say, do, and post whatever we want. If that’s so, that we can talk about anything we want. We can talk about current events, and past events. That is why sometimes, politicians can also use this to their advantage - they can use their existing image as a politician to put an influence over the netizens and the like. Some logical fallacies that can be possible for this infograph are Questionnable Authority and Overgeneralizations. Since this mostly consists of statistics, they did not really mention how they got such data, and on how big of a survey did they do – we cannot really just trust the logos and the seemingly ethos this media gives us. The negative message that this tries to present is on how the internet can be a ground for winning votes that are not really for the right candidate. The positive side though is on how it can do anything – it can expose a stain a certain politician has, and it would make the leaders of politics know their subjects more, to know what and how they really feel. Thus, this empowers the people who have internet access. It shows that if you have internet access, you can do anything. But what about those without internet access? Maybe for a country like America, cases like that most likely belong to the 1% of the total population but it just make underdeveloped countries weak. I think though that this does not really serve media maker’s interest. It’s just that it’s that way for the majority of people, and that’s the way it is for the maker. Yes, maybe they really do disempower underdeveloped countries, but the point here is on how social media affects politics. So of course, if there’s no internet access, there’s no social media, on the grounds that social media refers to a social-interaction in space for communication.
Maybe there are more about these statistics that they have posted. They have only limited their searches to the U.S. elections, but what about the rest of the world? We have a lot more to learn about social media and its effects to politics. Just what is it really is happening? Are we saying the results? Are we changing the results? Are we bringing about the results? Or maybe it does not really matter at all? I thought at first that this is something really awesome. Just imagine, we, citizens, can bring about our own society. But then again, is that really what is happening? Or are we just in a trap of an online frenzy? Tweet, Like, Share, whatever it may be, we must all know our responsibilities.
Teodoro Benigno, a Filipino journalist who passed away due to liver cancer last June 2005, has left us within his long sixty years of print media career a curious case of the Philippines titled: Culture: The real culprit. This was posted on the opinions section of philstar website last March 2002, and it probably has a hard-copy on the said newspaper as well, aiming for the attention of the Filipino citizens, whether young or old, rich or poor, for them to be aware of the state the Philippine society is in today. The article started off with quotes and examples from past presidents, other intellectual high-authority personalities. With all of these quotes incorporated, the main topic of this article is simply about the Philippine society, government, and advancement on the verge of collapsing – it’s there, but with a very shaky foundation, a very inconsistent culture. For me though, despite the title of it being culture as the culprit, there are hints of the author seemingly pointing out names of politicians that could be accused of the state of poverty the Philippines is experiencing today. Although it must be something that was on the boom at that time, on the first two years of the 21st century, too.
The values being presented here are obviously that of a Filipino - a Filipino particularly at the end of the infamous Estrada embezzlement case. It was the peak of the media then, and as I have looked into more, former president Joseph Estrada’s case was actually the very first impeachment case that was broadcasted by radio and television media to the public Filipinos. With this being the case, ad hominem is a dominant logical fallacy in this article. As stated before, it mentioned the various names of certain politicians, making them take the blame. Red herring is also evident in the sense that the author introduced past presidents. Well, it could be said that it’s to support the succeeding statements about the Philippine culture, but it rather seemed that the author wanted to put his opinion on how the politicians in the Philippines really are first, and how the culture rooted under our society comes after. Ethos can be seen in this article in a way that the author, Mr. Teodoro Benigno, was someone that was looked up to at that time. I didn’t personally had the experience of looking up to him, but based from online sources, he seems to be a very influential writer and journalist as he served as the official press secretary of former president Corazon Aquino. In line to this, he has pointed out more negative messages than positive messages. With all his negative messages summarized, it all meant the same thing: Philippine advancement is going down. The Filipinos cannot escape from their embedded Spanish culture, along with the corruption and the sense of camaraderie among groups. The positive messages though, from what I have understood, is that we are aware that this is happening. It is not the case where in we are not doing anything against it – we just cannot do anything against. Again, due to the cultural restraints we have, such as the delicadeza that Mr. Benigno have mentioned. Since this article mainly introduces the readers of philstar, it could be said that it empowers the people who are aware of the culture that we are being immersed in and even now – the culture of delizadeza, the family-centered way of thinking, the religious aspects, and the American neo-colonization – that are not practicing such acts, and depowers either the people who are aware of these and still practicing it, and the people who do not know them at all.
There are many factors not included in the article that could easily be misunderstood and not understood at all if a person in 2014 were to read it. I wasn’t born at this time yet, and I wasn’t really interested in Philippine History before, so I wouldn’t know much about what the author is really trying to say, nor the circumstances and problems surrounding the author and in the country at that time. Perhaps, a little more research would help, and some feedbacks from people who were actually born, active, and curious at that time too. But then again, I thought at first that this article was a huge chore. It was wordy and it looked like it would swallow me up whole with the words. Since it was featured in the opinion section, I expected it to be more straightforward and more biased, but then it was actually quite metaphorical and somewhat objective in a way. Once (more like, as many times needed to fully understand) read thoroughly, I was aware that it really meant that the Philippines at that time was viewed as something really low. It was as if we were a wandering hobo man – a beggar in the wild streets of the world. We were lost, overpowered by the surrounding super powers, getting pressured by our peer countries after leaving Spain’s rule. What can we really do? How can we really make ourselves stand on our own?
Saint☆Onii-san, (Saint Young Men) is a Japanese manga (comic) series written and illustrated by Hikaru Namakura since 2006. This seinen manga is currently being serialized in Japan’s monthly magazine Morning 2 by Kodansha. Saint Young Men has attracted a lot of attention in the succeeding years, resulting in the production of an original video animation (OVA) starting last December 2012, and just recently having a cinema adaptation screened last May 10, 2013 , both directed by Noriko Takao from A1-Pictures animation studio, which grossed a total of $1,888,062. As far as the traditional meaning of seinen goes, it is term used as a subset category of manga referring to the age group and the gender that is labeled under it – which in this case, males in the 15-24 age group. Although with these standards set, I think that this series is intended not only for males, not only for Japanese, and not only to 15-24 year olds, but for all us – even to females and non-Japanese like me, and even to my 44-year old dad. Although I do quite understand that one needs to be mature enough to read such content, as it might really change your opinions.
The plot of this manga is really simple – the daily troubles and joys of Jesus Christ and Siddharta Gautama Buddha while sharing a small, studio-type apartment in the city of Tokyo, Japan. It really does portray Jesus Christ, the one we all know as the personalization of Christianity, and Siddharta Gautama Buddha, the one we all know as the founder of Buddhism living normal, (although not really as normal) lives. Jesus was portrayed as a very carefree person – quite skinny, pale, long, wavy black hair, and with a horn crown. Buddha, on the other hand, was as a very orderly person – somehow plump, long earlobes, hair in a bun(?), and with a button-looking mole(? hair) at the center of his forehead. Both of them are currently in their vacation to the mortal world and they have chosen Japan as their vacation spot simply because it was the easiest compared to Israel or India. The characters were shown only wearing a simple printed t-shirt and jeans. The t-shirts though were actually printed by Buddha, little to Jesus’ knowledge, and Jesus actually has this past-time of posting television-drama reviews on his blog in the internet, something that Buddha knows but Jesus still desperately. Quite amusing, I must say. Although this may look blasphemous at first glance, I really think that it’s quite the opposite – it’s the best representation of what religion really is. Buddha, which speaks of Buddhism, is the belief that is mostly dominant in Asian or Eastern countries. Jesus, which speaks of Christianity, represents the European or Western beliefs in religion - also a dominant belief. Religion in Japan is very broad, diverse, and open. Although they have Shintoism within their roots, they are not as particular as the Philippines as to what right the religious sect of their society to the government, or what individual citizens have a view on religion. They don’t have the impression, “If you’re not a Roman Catholic, then you’re not one of us” indebted in their society since they really believe in diversity and the right of the individual to believe in what he wants to believe in. So what how does Buddha and Jesus relate to this?
Although I have only watched the OVAs and the movie, it had the ethos and the pathos elements in it, along with ad hominem. Ethos and pathos can be observed on how they tried to get the attention of the consumers, especially to people like me who just happened to stumble upon it by seeing pictures of an anime Jesus and Buddha in tumblr, who are very curious, and very sympathetic as to what the daily lives of what the Son of God and the Enlightened One would be in the vast land of Tokyo. Pathos can be observed mainly on how their dialogues seem to come out as true, as they portray very influential characters as Jesus and Buddha. Ad hominem is very evident in the characters of Jesus and Buddha themselves. Although for me, the jabs the author put in their characters are more of a refreshing comedy than a homerun blasphemy, it still points out Jesus and Buddha as mortals – that they also commit mistakes, worry, needs a break, etc., all the common notion that we all know does not apply to them since they are the perfect beings. But then again, there’s always a positive and a negative side to things. The negative side to this media form is its blasphemous themes some very conservative sections might be against at. Just by simply using the holy Jesus Christ in such sense can be a grave offense to them by itself. The positive, on the other hand is pretty simple: we can all get along. Just as how Buddhism is known to be a very old religion, Buddha is being as a caring mother as he can for Jesus, with Christianity being quite the new religion as compared to Buddhism.
As I have mentioned earlier, Western beliefs and the Asian beliefs are some of the main topics in this media form. This just simply empowers both, rather, it empowers everything. This series, as I believe, was created to make an understanding. It’s to make the Japanese citizens realize how their culture look like to the Western belief system the Asian belief system as symbolized in Jesus’ and Buddha’s characters. Adding to the fact on how Jesus and Buddha are shown as best friends in the films, therefore we can say that it just shows how the Japanese culture looks like from the outside point of view, from the joint Western and Asian belief systems. Although there is not much data about the author available, I believe that this is the intent of the author in making this seinen manga. Well, technically I haven’t really thought much about these while I was watching it, but it just reminded me really; how would I look like from God’s perspective? Would God be happy if he were to live in my country? Just as how the small apartment symbolizes the world, Jesus and Buddha are both trying their best to live in it – to enjoy it, to make the best out of it, that until the moment their vacation ends, they would have all the fun memories and not regret anything. Religion in this sense, just tells us: what do you really want to do in life? What are you living for? Why are you here? Let’s just forget all those things for a while and have nice, sweet slice of life.
References:
Saint Young Men Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Young_Men
Movie Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-P4BJdOMce8
Full Movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVf1YpATtWo
The ad was aimed for online consumers of all ages, ethnicity, class, and profession as long as they were aware of the Cyber Monday trend and the reputation Patagonia has. Although, we could also say that it was aimed for everyone – be it an online consumer or a real life consumer – for them to be aware and to think about the consequences behind the act of buying such high quality products, according to their e-mail distributor which included the ad, “because Patagonia wants to be in business for a good long time – and leave a world inhabitable for our kids – we want to do the opposite of every other business today. We ask you to buy less and to reflect before you spend a dime on this jacket or anything else,” It empowers resourcefulness and disempowers reckless and irresponsible use of limited resources. They are trying to make the notion of “the lesser products you buy - the better person you are, and the more products you buy - the lesser of a good person you are” a statement that we, as consumers, should all live by. Although despite these claims of resourcefulness and to not buy their products on the most-celebrated online-shopping spree Cyber Monday to look back at the costs of materials, I personally think that there is a hint of reverse-psychology in this ad, and that they actually want consumers to purchase their products more, having the impression now that their products are more environmental-resolving and somehow making consumers feel that they were spending Cyber Monday, or even on normal days, effectively more than the rest of those who didn’t buy Patagonia products. Yes, they presented valid data, statistics, and procedures (logos) which supports their claim of being a company that uses high-end raw material to produce high-end products within the e-mail that contained the ad, and also explained that such actions caused a great toll to nature and leaving behind a huge environmental footprint (ethos), but this made the ad appeal to the pity, that nature needs to be saved and we, the consumers, are making nature suffer the more we demand. Oversimplification and ethos can also be observed after being persuaded by the causes and the effects. The act of “taking the pledge” makes the consumer really wanting to take the pledge since there is enough evidence supporting that he/she should, and that not taking the pledge would make him/her less of a good person, thus making the choice seem like: are you going to take the pledge and help nature? Or are you not going to take the pledge and indulge in your selfless acts?
Although this type of consumerism is mostly about the Western culture, since the Philippines, as far as I know, doesn't have events like Black Friday and even I for one have only come across the term Cyber Monday just now! The culture of a capitalist society is being presented here and despite the Philippines claiming to be one, it has apparently not felt by, well, all of its citizens including me. This particular ad has then made me really think a lot about the consequences our demands as consumers have. I have just recently became a frequent online shopper and yes, I do agree that shopping online is much easier and you do not really feel the effects right away, but I did not know that the effects would go be this big! I mean, wow, one billion dollars in one day! It’s amazing and at the same time scary as to how much people are willing to spend, and are currently spending. I guess ads like Patagonia’s which are not going with the influx of mainstream “Buy me! 50% off!!” ads to be expected on that day would really bring an impact, making their products more likeable and the consumers feel better about themselves. Did this reverse-psychology trick work? How about I try it on this paper?
She was shown in a position that is suggestively asking for erotic stimulation and was tied by the shoe’s shoelaces – with both of her hands tied above her head, and the tied shoelaces around her breasts, navel area, and pelvic area, and somehow emphasizing said parts. Since the main point of the ad was to advertise their shoe products, and based from the ad’s usage of images and theme, the target audience could then be deducted to the male domination – of all ages, races, class, and profession. It seems to me that this ad is displaying the dominance of the male sex over the females – that women should be bounded underfoot by the men’s biddings. The shoe serves as a phallic symbol which then empowers men’s self-esteem, making them really feel better about themselves. This ad seems to give the male domination the idea that since they are born as males, they have the innate power to dominate while females, as shown in the ad, would then bow down to their biddings, serving men as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. This then encourages them to patron the product, making profit for MAX Shoes Company.
Although there was a discussion on whether or not the female model was actually Chinese or Japanese, since she was wearing a yukata, the Japanese traditional clothing for women, as opposed to a beizi, the Chinese traditional clothing, but is said to look more Chinese than Japanese, still, let’s grant that the woman in the ad is of Chinese descent. With that given, this ad features two cultures: the Asian (Chinese, Japanese) culture and the European (Swiss, German) culture. We know from history that the Chinese had the tradition of foot-binding since the Song Dynasty. This custom involves the tight binding of young girls to prevent further growth by wearing really small shoes that was said to break bones, arch toes, and deform feet. It also serves as a beauty statement before and aligned with it is the symbol of elegant status. Basically, the smaller feet you own, the prettier and high-class you are. Thus, the Chinese culture is then symbolized at the act of binding a Chinese woman to a foot to show her beauty - twisted, yes, but the implementation of such culture shows. The European culture, on the hand, is symbolized by the shoe itself and the act of bondage. The design of the shoe is something not of the Asian culture and Europeans, particularly the Germans, are usually stereotyped as people who are hungry with power and domination. Bondage, or BDSM in a wider sense, is something that exists in every culture. But then despite the Chinese concept of foot biding, there’s also the Japanese art of shibari (to tie), used to explain the usage of the rope in an artistic way. But then again, it is in the Western (or European) culture that actually popularized our idea of what BDSM is today – and that includes the concept of bondage depicted in the said print-ad.There is an attacked directed in this ad – specifically, to the women. Ad hominem automatically follows whenever talks about sexism will be raised. As there will always be prejudice and discrimination in sexism, ad hominem speaks for the attack of people rather than the topic itself, so it really follows. On another perspective, it also appeals to pity – as it shows how women are being treated in ways that would only benefit men and would then beg for the sympathy of other people to such women who are being treated in that way.
Initially, I really did view this ad as sexist. Since it features shoes as a phallic symbol, it then denotes domination. Although I do understand that it also incorporates the culture and stereotypes of cultures, it still shows the point that one gender is preferred, or somehow seemed higher in position compared to the other. The appeal that men are in authority, that women are to be tied down, that women serves as a pleasure, that men should be pleased, that tying a woman down would prove yourself to be manly. But then I thought, would the ad work the same if it’s a man getting tied instead of a woman? Would there be questions raised? Would it be accepted as a social norm? Well, probably to some sub-cultures it might be accepted, but in general, it would look weird and forced – something that would be socially unacceptable. But if it’s a woman, as shown in this ad, there would be no further questions asked. It would be accepted as something normal; something that we all know to be normal like how it’s grounding us to our cultural and perceived beliefs. Indeed, it really is a foot-binding.
[2] Mark Copyranter. (2009, September 21) All kinds of fetishes shoehorned into sleazy shoe ad. Retrieved from http://copyranter.blogspot.com/2009/09/all-kinds-of-fetishes-shoehorned-into.html
[3] Kensho,H. la sciamana, la morte e altre storie. Retrieved from http://www.hikarikesho.com/eng/shibari.php
[4] BDSM. (n.d.). Retrieved February 10, 2014 from the BDSM Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BDSM
[5] Foot Binding. (n.d.). Retrieved February 10, 2014 from the Foot Binding Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_binding
A commercial was released last January 18, 2014 by a Japanese airline company, said to be the largest airline in Japan, All Nippon Airways (ANA), to promote its expanded offering of international flights to all their customers, particularly to the Japanese citizens who are rather reserved and would not want to leave their country at all. Although without the intention to offend, it has apparently received lots of negative opinions and feedbacks from foreign customers living in Japan. A spokesman of ANA, Ryosei Nomura, had it intended to be humorous, but as far as their Japanese culture concerns, such humor doesn’t apparently blend well with the foreigners.
This 30-second commercial features two Japanese males, a rather tall one and a shorter one, looking out from inside the waiting area and watching the planes come and go along the runway as they were talking on how Haneda airport has gotten more international routes. Surprisingly, they were speaking in English! The taller man replied with a “Finally” from the shorter man’s “Haneda has more international flights nowadays”. Japanese subtitles were also provided in the commercial, of course, since majority of the Japanese citizens understand their own language than English. The two gentlemen continued their talk on the progress of international routes to Vancouver and to Hanoi, and then the shorter gentlemen commented how exciting that was, looking at his taller conversation partner. The taller gentlemen looked at the shorter man and said “You wanna hug?” leaving the shorter man with a surprised face. “Such a Japanese reaction,” commented the taller one. “Because I am Japanese…” “I see.” By this point, the taller man looked at the view again and suddenly snapped his head to the other man saying, “Let’s change the image of Japanese people,” the shorter man, at this sudden plot twist, was then shown wearing a blonde wig with a long, exaggerated fake nose saying “Sure” in an American accent that wasn’t there before. They then ended the commercial with a “Wanna go?” “Yeah,” and the two men carrying their luggage as they were walking towards the plane.
With that content summarized, I personally find this commercial more of a humorous one too. True, there was stereotyping involved, but it was the kind of stereotyping that meant no harm. There are apparently few non-Asian foreigners in Japan and Westerners are often stereotyped as having blonde hair, blue eyes and big noses. Since this commercial was made to encourage the reserved Japanese people to explore and travel to different countries, the act of the two gentlemen talking in English rather than in Japanese, them being excited over the fact of more international routes, the taller man wanting a hug – these are all examples of Western culture that the Japanese people are generally aware of. The message of the commercial simply just states that the Japanese people should be more “adventurous” and to embrace the other cultures as well, including the Western culture they are so fond of stereotyping. I may not know a lot about Japanese culture, but I do know that they are really nationalistic, of some sorts. I’m not saying that this is a bad thing and in fact, I do believe this is a good thing, but for this commercial, it serves as a wall for the Japanese citizens to accept other cultures – to bring understanding.
It is evident in my observations that this commercial used the bandwagon relevance fallacy to attract their customers since this was aimed to promote ANA’s extended offering of international flights. Although this ad was mostly for the Japanese customers, with the advent of technology and the wide range of consumers, foreign customers got themselves aware of this this ad and actually found it offensive and racial discriminating. Perhaps part of the story not being told to us is how Japanese citizens really view foreigners. It’s really difficult for a person from a different culture to evaluate something made from another culture, and for that same culture. Cultural relativity is a topic that we all agreed to be objective in how it is subjective to a culture. On another note, ANA spokesman Ryosei Nomura intended the ad to encourage the Japanese to be more international – to show that they are changing. Their intention was not to offend, and that they had apologized to each of the customers for making them feel uncomfortable. They were also thankful at these customers for bringing the issue up, since it also helped them lessen the risk of making a bad name for the airline. They have also passed the issue to the section in charge of the advertisements, but as of now, they still haven’t found a way to deal with the commercial. Now I really still do think that this commercial means no harm. It’s just that it’s misunderstood by the majority of the foreign costumers since they don’t really understand the Japanese culture. The same goes for the Japanese culture too. They thought it would make them look cute if they played with the blonde, blue-eyes, and long-nosed foreigner gag, which it appears to have been in their system for a long time now. There’s just a sensitive line as to how things are portrayed in another culture, and how it is evaluated in another.
References:
[1] “Racist Japanese ANA (All Nippon Airways) Commercial” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCjxzpSrFP4)
[2] Withnall, A (2014 January) “Japanese airline ANA apologises for ‘racist’ advert stereotyping foreigners as having big noses and blonde hair” (http://www.independent.co.uk/)
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