{"id":57017,"date":"2018-11-13T03:16:09","date_gmt":"2018-11-13T03:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=57017"},"modified":"2018-11-13T03:27:50","modified_gmt":"2018-11-13T03:27:50","slug":"stop-using-mixed-race-people-as-symbols-of-interracial-unity-to-ease-your-white-guilt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=57017","title":{"rendered":"Stop using mixed race people as symbols of interracial unity to ease your white guilt"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/friktionmagasin.dk\/stop-using-mixed-race-people-as-symbols-of-interracial-unity-to-ease-your-white-guilt-997208eb420b\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em><strong>Stop using mixed race people as symbols of interracial unity to ease your white guilt<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/friktionmagasin.dk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Friktion<\/a><br \/>\n2018-05-09<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/sophie-achiam-238396136\/?originalSubdomain=dk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Sophie Buzak-Achiam<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/friktionmagasin.dk\/stop-using-mixed-race-people-as-symbols-of-interracial-unity-to-ease-your-white-guilt-997208eb420b\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"progressiveMedia-image js-progressiveMedia-image\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn-images-1.medium.com\/max\/1596\/1*q1ARfvUAVXEgqO74rMkX7Q.jpeg\" width=\"300\" border=\"0\" data-src=\"https:\/\/cdn-images-1.medium.com\/max\/1596\/1*q1ARfvUAVXEgqO74rMkX7Q.jpeg\" \/><\/a><br \/>\n<small>Illustration: Mette Clante<\/small><\/p>\n<p>Dutch beer company <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Heineken\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Heineken<\/a> has recently <a href=\"https:\/\/adage.com\/article\/cmo-strategy\/heineken-light-s-lighter-ad-mistake\/312887\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">faced backlash<\/a> for its \u201clighter is better\u201d ad, where a bartender with light skinned Latino appearance slides a beer past three dark skinned Black people towards an Eurasian woman, with whom he shares a wink, before the slogan \u201csometimes lighter is better\u201d appears. As a mixed race person, who might be racialised in a similar way to the exotic yet safely light skinned woman in the ad, this ad struck a well-known chord. Spending a good half of my life in a white Danish environment, I have often found my ambiguous racial appearance used by white people as a symbol of a conforming, non-threatening otherness. Although still seen as a person of color, I also embody a whiteness that can make me come across as safe mediator to ease racial tensions and white guilt.<\/p>\n<p>Considering the overwhelming whiteness in European advertisement in general, I don\u2019t believe it to be a coincidence that Heineken, as a white owned company, chooses to use people of color and racially ambiguous people as the stars of this ad. In representing the \u201clighter is better\u201d demographic, the two lighter skinned actors become pawns to the white system which uses them to mask its racism, that becomes perhaps more subtle with the acceptance of some people of color&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Read the entire article <a href=\"https:\/\/friktionmagasin.dk\/stop-using-mixed-race-people-as-symbols-of-interracial-unity-to-ease-your-white-guilt-997208eb420b\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In representing the \u201clighter is better\u201d demographic, the two lighter skinned actors become pawns to the white system which uses them to mask its racism, that becomes perhaps more subtle with the acceptance of some people of color.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1649,12,16,8413,28,8,23674],"tags":[25314,29075,29074],"class_list":["post-57017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anthropology","category-articles","category-asia","category-communications","category-europe","category-media-archive","category-social-justice","tag-friktion","tag-heineken","tag-sophie-buzak-achiam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=57017"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57018,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57017\/revisions\/57018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}