Time to brush my teeth. Whoa! That's surprising to see an person of African decent advertising a Taiwanese brand of dental hygiene products. I heard that racism against black folks was as much of a problem in Taiwan as it is the United States. Oh, wait. This IS racist. From the picture you might not see much wrong. The label says: 黑人牙刷 or in English, "Black Person Toothbrush." Really. No shiting you, that is the translation. Awkward....but beyond awkwardness of the English translation is of the uber-racist history of this brand.
Let it be known that 黑人 or "black person" does not have the same ring to in Chinese as it does in English. It is the what folks of African decent are called in Mandarin Chinese. This is the common and accepted name . However, the innocently named toothbrush brand, "Darlie" actually used to be "Darkie." For real. Change the 'K' to an 'L' and you attempt to erase some pretty fucked up and racist history. But you know, they couldn't totally let it go. They had to make sure their consumer base still remembered the reference. Hence, black person toothpaste and toothbrushes. Not, ahem, just for black folks! For all who like to participate in the lowest-of the-low marketing.
Is the black person reference that bad? No, it wouldn't be if Black folks were revered for their dental hygiene or even not a group targeted for oppression and discrimination in many developed(and developing) countries (i.e. US, Taiwan). But this is the fact. So, I encourage you to look at this short history of the brand from Wiki. It's pretty informative and has a picture of the old-school advertisements. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darlie
Just thought that I would point out that I use a toothbrush branded with racist marketing. In case you wanted to know.
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