Dove is floating in hot water over a racially insensitive advertisement promoted on Facebook. The ad was a photograph collage of a black woman wearing a brown shirt, then removing it eventually revealing a white woman in a lighter, cream-colored shirt. There’s also a third image showing a white woman removing her shirt, which then appears an Asian woman. The Facebook ad was first spotted by NayTheMUA and quickly reposted by thousands of users on the social media platform. On Saturday, Dove, which is owned by Dutch-British transnational consumer goods company Unilever, apologized for the ad through the company’s Twitter account. “An image we recently posted on Facebook missed the mark in representing women of color thoughtfully,” the apology read. “We deeply regret the offense it caused.” Dove also repeated this sentiment via their Facebook page. “Dove is committed to representing the beauty of diversity. In an image we posted this week, we missed the mark in thoughtfully representing women of color and we deeply regret the offense that it has caused. The feedback that has been shared is important to us and we’ll use it to guide us in the future,” the statement read. Ironically, this isn’t the first time Dove have been under scrutiny for a poor choice in marketing tactics. In 2011, a controversial ad showed three women standing in front of a wall with the words “before” and “after.” The woman standing in front of the “before” image had dark skin, a woman in between had medium-toned skin and the woman in front of the “after” image was white. Dove at the time stated, “All three women are intended to demonstrate the ‘after’ product benefit. We do not condone any activity or imagery that intentionally insults any audience.” Dove ad 2011
