Hell Pizzas have been "shit for two years" admits own marketing man
Corporate apologist, Kirk, with megaphone having his right of reply.The best part of the anti-racism protest this evening was when the Hell pizza marketing guru admitted their product has been "shit for two years." Beautiful. He also said that they "wouldn't do racist advertising anymore" and then tried to say that he didn't accept that what was done was racist... but it was offensive... but not really (?) What a fool. And a cock.
The authorised Hell spokesman, Kirk, the man taking all the (dis)credit of their lame-arse, offensive ad campaigns, gave a quasi-apology of sorts to the protesters while I was inside taking up his offer of ordering a free pizza - the most expensive with all the toppings (that I never ate or picked up because I won't eat that shit - the point is to cost them time and money). He must of said something to placate them because when I emerged I was informed that he had made some sort of a half apology. It's not one that I accept... if it was one at all.I explained to the mob (a few dozen souls) that my first reaction when I saw the "brownies" thing on someone's blog was to think that whoever came up with that was a cock. My second reaction was that it was racistly offensive, and the third was that the little cock-wipes should be ignored. Ignore them and they lose. Ignore them and they have wasted their money. But then I was facebooked this protest as an event and I had some thinking to do. Wouldn't it just give them the free publicity they were counting on?
After some pondering I came to the realisation that by just ignoring it I was actually acquiescing in their racism. If everyone in a position to do anything about it ignored it then the only thing left for them to do would be to go more extreme and become more offensive, more racist. Other firms would follow their lead and public discourse would become more racist than it is already. How could we let that happen? We can't.
The only funny thing about all this is that Kirk probably thinks he did a great job. He had some junior cock types off to one side sniggering to themselves during the protest learning from the master. Morons. Watching a washed up hack without a creative cell left in his burnt-out, drugged-scorched mind attempting to defend the indefensible would have been a sad scene if it wasn't for the fact he was so smug and uncontrite. I called him a racist, unfunny, disingenuous, liar, a cock and more besides at the rally so I make these comments here in the same spirit - accuracy and corporate accountability.And just to prove how disingenuous his apology was the hideous staff flunky who was taking the orders was wearing what must have been a specially made t-shirt just to show us what cocks they are:
Are they just for the white staff or does everyone have to wear it?Doesn't look very apologetic to me.
Doesn't seem like a genuine apology to me.
Doesn't look like they have learned their lesson. Next time they try this shit on it will be the nuclear option first up. The brand will be bashed and trashed.
PHOTOS: Andrew Wilson
posted by Tim Selwyn @ 8:24 pm
15 comments
15 Comments:
What a load of rubbish, Wayne. There are plenty of comedians who make fun of white people. Whether, I get offended by it or not really depends on how talented the comedian is, and how funny the joke is. For example, two comedians whose humour I love are Chris Rock & Dave Chapelle. Just about all of their humour is at white peoples expense, but it is funny so I don't mind. Locally, Dai Henwood made a great joke on 7 days about the Auckland Grammer rugby team. Because it was funny, I thought it was hiliarious.
So your comment about the proverbial hitting the fan if there was a joke against white people just isn't true. The other rubbish comment is about "Anglo Saxon's" (who uses that term these days) being (quote)"sensitive and precious". The English in particular are known for their great humour at making fun of themselves. Little Britian would be a great place to start, Wayne.
Maybe they should hold a referendum and see if anyone other than the 10 or so people who turned up to protest think that this isnt rather funny and true
"the hideous staff flunky who was taking the orders" - Was trying to make a fucking living and gets stepped on by corporate ass-holes as much as any other worker in this country.
Certainly wearing a uniform given to you by your boss doesent mean you deserve to be abused, she needs to be supported as do the whole working class not called a "hideous flunky" by someone who is supposedly writing an article in support of human rigts.
Good job on going after hell for their stupid advertising campaign, but leave their workers alone.
The English in particular are known for their great humour at making fun of themselves. Little Britan would be a great place to start, Wayne.
All comedians find social and cultural material from the societies they live in and turn it into something absurd, something ridiculous. So most jokes made by the English will naturally be about the English and English society, and Polynesian humour will often be about Polynesians and polynesian society.
Eddie Murphy draws on traits of white people and black people for raw material, and I as a Chinese enjoy the work of a hilarious Indo-Canadian guy called Russell Peters, who makes fun of Indians and Chinese (together with perfectly mimicked Indian and Chinese accented english).
So the fact that Brits enjoy Little Britain, tells nothing about what their actual tolerance threshold for national or racial taunts or stereotyping from non-British people really is.
And in any case the sting from jokes and humour delivered by comedians is normally momentary, causing mild embarrassment to the person or group who happens to be the butt of the joke at the time, but quickly passing over and then it is the turn of someone else.
But not with these billboards - they put one ethnic group up there for all others to look at and jeer at, and associate that one ethnic group with a cultural practice obviously abhorrent to many people in this country. And this, not as just part of a solitary joke, but with billboards and T-shirts - propaganda over a wide areal extent for a prolonged period of time.
So even it if it was acceptable as a joke told just once (and that is debatable), even the best humoured among us would get sick of the same joke, told at our expense, over and over and over again. Yet this is essentially what these billboards do.
How do you think a Polynesian kid, who most likely loves dogs, feels when he sees this? Most likely acute embarrassment and discomfort.
Replace the word with 'whitey', 'chinaman', 'black' and all but the most obtuse would understand the slogan to be completely unacceptable. And so should 'brownie.'
Sometimes the dividing line between what is acceptable and unacceptable is quite hazy - especially when cross cultural issues are involved.
But a good rule of thumb, that will get you by 99 % of the time is the Golden Rule.
I'm Chinese. If billboards had made fun of Asians in a similar way, I certainly would not enjoy that. And most whites would certainly not enjoy being called 'whitey' 10 times a day over several weeks.
Therefore it would be a reasonable assumption to make that a significant proportion of Polynesians would find the 'brownie' line to be quite offensive. (although some will no doubt hide their true feelings for fear of being accused of being over-sensitive or too PC by the mainstream).
And that is what makes it unacceptable. Not exactly rocket science.
apparently Hell has been bought out by Dominos, or so i hear....another reason to boycot the corporate scum.... I knew there was some unholy union going on when i saw the fridge encorporating Cocacola design and Hell's flame logo.
JamesP . Amused but not surprised that someone like you would take my comments out of context and try to label me as some sort of Marxist ( what the hell?). You obviously don't want to really carry out meaningful debate on the topic so instead come on here and aim to put me, someone you have never met, down personally. What I said was that it is arrogant and ignorant to use freedom of speech as a justification for the type of racist humour that Hell, in this case, has employed here. Bullies hide behind this sort of sick racist humour all the time and then say - we'e allowed to say it ( yes of course they are )and that cause someone finds it funny then it's ok to say it. AND of course anyone who dis agrees with them is called all sorts of names and written off as PC do gooders. It's a convenient tactic that works where noone dares question it but it won't work here.
Those of you who discuss about trivial things like "this vs that" or "this person said this" or "i love/hate this because.."
Then don't bother continuing to read because my comments will just either dumbfound you, or just enrage you for no reason whatsoever and you will just feel compelled to defend your backwards beliefs.
I pointed this ad out to Bomber a while ago because I thought it was a funny take on a even more funny news story.
It WASN'T funny because the man who ate the dog was Tongan, it WAS funny because it was a misunderstanding of cultural practices and acceptable behavior in a foreign country...which just justifies the idea that these divisions we make such a fuss over and take so much pride in, are just stupid because in the end we are all humans. Why should we take pride in where we live and/or grew up over other people...that just breeds hatred and ENCOURAGES division.
If we didn't have these stupid egos about our race, culture, religions, favourite sports teams, left wing vs right wing etc, and actually fucking realised "HEY HOLY SHIT, WE ARE ALL HERE AND WE ALL FEEL THE SAME, SUFFER THE SAME, LOVE THE SAME, HATE THE SAME, AND WE ALL OCCUPY THIS SAME PLANET"...then maybe this billboard wouldn't be seen as a hateful, racist, bigoted piece of viral marketing...it would instead be seen as what it is...a funny take on a funny news story.
A funny look at how a guy from a another place did something that wasn't accepted here and it was made a news item...IF WE DIDN'T ACT LIKE UN-EVOLVED APES AND DIDN'T HAVE THESE DIVISIONS, IT WOULDN'T AND SHOULDN'T BE AN ISSUE.
"Our" tribe doesn't understand his tribes cultures so if we make fun of his tribes cultural practices then its hate speech right? How about we stop this bullshit collective tribal pride nonsense, stop these wars and divisions.
Or am I thinking too far ahead?
In the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal. - John F. Kennedy
And no I'm not a nationalist...if you think by my words that I am in any kind of support of any backwards pride/hate collective, eat shit and die, because it's time as a species we rid ourselves of this way of thinking that has been dividing and killing us all since the dawn of time.
Luke owns you all - before reading previous posts i was thinking you are all contradicting your self's in every argument you place.... its funny you all look like knobs to the world reading this - sorry but no other way to put it!
My feelings go out to the young and naïve Marketing Student who came up with and thought this would be a funny and only mildly offensive campaign. I hear he's been copping a lot of the flak, which is terrible really given it was Hell's punt to run the ads.
It's a bit of a shame because as cheap pizzas go they've never left a bad taste in my mouth before. It's a bit of a character brand and a shame for it to abandon its moral high ground which was its beauty (assuming you don't consider capitalist enterprise evil by definition). ie, they were just like the rest of the pizza places, just with slightly better pizzas, local owners (note: the 'last 2 years' thing might be a reference to the foreign ownership in that time) and a total tongue-in-cheek dig at religion and laziness ... or whatever connections you care to make, really.
IMHO they should apologise properly and ban those T-shirts from use by staff at work in their stores..
A shift worker in a fast food restaurant doesn't deserve to be held accountable for the shite decisions of the corporate HQ.
Calling someone a "hideous staff flunkie" for wearing a t-shirt she likely had no choice but to wear is unfair as hell.
Anon 3:03pm 29th: "Good job on going after hell for their stupid advertising campaign, but leave their workers alone."
&
Lissa above:
I did not enquire as to her shifts and roster what I noted when she was serving me was her unfailing cheeriness and going out of her way to sing the praises of the Hell pizza brand. She was a little cheerleader. If she didn't want to wear the racist t-shirt she shouldn't have. She had it on, so I suppose she didn't have an issue with it. That's from my own observations and interaction with the staff member concerned. I stand by that description of her every bit as I stand by my description of the marketing flunky sent out to try to appease the protesters.
Tim:
She was a little cheerleader. If she didn't want to wear the racist t-shirt she shouldn't have. She had it on, so I suppose she didn't have an issue with it.
Any clothing in your closet made in China you have any issue with?
Don't cherry pick your morality.
Either you realise that these divisions we create by this stupid pride of ones origin, (in other words where our parents just so happened to fuck and/or our mothers just so happened to be here to give birth to us and/or where we just so happened to grow up), are just a primal instinct that we must overcome if we want to be apart of world where we are free of ego and can communicate with one another objectively without conflict.
The woman wearing the tee shirt was wearing a regular Hell Pizza shirt at the begining of the protest, and actually changed into the tee with the racist joke on it when the 'advertising' guy starting talking about free pizza... She doesn't even work at that branch, but was brought in from another elsewhere to confront to the protest... Everything thing is a game to these clowns.
hahahaha i think the t is mint! i work at hellz and im an islander its a funny t shirt hands down and whats with the sign calling us racist? That aint cool
But i gess there are always goin to be people who bitch and mone about everything
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