Qiaobi
A 49-second advert for Qiaobi, a brand of detergent manufactured by a Chinese firm set off a firestorm on various social media platforms in May 2016. The advert featured a black man attempting to flirt with a young Chinese woman. She smiled back at him but apparently thought he could do with some improvement, so she loaded him into a washing machine. After he had spent some time spinning, he came out an “enhanced-looking” version of himself: a fair Chinese man. In response to the “noise” that trailed the advert, the makers of Qiaobi came out to issue an apology which many described as more offensive than the advert it sought to redress. “We express our apologies to the African people because of the spread of the ad and the over amplification by the media, we sincerely hope that the media will not over-read it,” the statement said. Eventually, Qiaobi pulled the ad after running it for months.
