Booooooy, some of these corporations really need to get out of the pseudo activism business because many of them just can’t seem to do anything right—in America or abroad.
KFC Trinidad and Tobago is apologizing for its ill-advised decision to recognize Emancipation Day—an August 1 holiday that commemorates the emancipation of enslaved people of African descent in former British colonies in the Caribbean—by posting a graphic of a KFC chicken drummette accompanied by a shadow in the form of a Black power fist.
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It’s the epitome of “You had one job” displayed in a single image. All they had to do was write “Happy Emancipation Day” and put their little chicken bucket logo in the corner somewhere. But no, they had to be extra—which for KFC means putting a fried chicken drummette next to an internationally recognized symbol of Black pride. (They’ve also ensured that all future “drums vs. flats” debates will go off the rails almost immediately. I can just hear it now: “The revolution won’t be televised, it’ll be deep-fried...and y’all pro-flats ass niggas are the one’s Harriet would’ve shot!”)
Of course, the social media backlash was swift with people calling out this racist imagery.
To be fair, some people also pointed out that the stereotypical connection between Black people and fried chicken isn’t as relevant everywhere as it is in the U.S.
But, then again, KFC Jamaica managed to whip up a “Happy Emancipation Day” image that was...well...normal.
KFC Guyana also did the damn thing by putting together a beautiful, controversy-free image to use in commemorating the holiday.
Anyway, according to Buzz-Caribbean, the image posted to KFC TT’s social media pages Saturday was quickly deleted and replaced by an image of balloons with the Colonel Sanders logo on them. That image was also deleted, likely because someone figured out that “Happy Emancipation Day...Now here’s a bunch of colonizer face-balloons to illustrate our solidarity” probably doesn’t send the right message either.
KFC TT ended up posting an apology for the whole fiasco.
“Our intention was to support and recognise the importance of this historically significant event,” the caption reads. “We recognise that our posts commemorating Emancipation Day drew some negative responses. Clearly we got it wrong and we want to unreservedly apologise for the offense caused. As a result, we will be reviewing the approval process of all our communications to avoid situations like this reoccurring.”
(Updated 3/3/22 with new details)
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