Avril Lavigne, an early 2000s vehicle to market commercialised 'skate' culture to pre-teens, is back, with an over-produced, culturally insensitive mess of a track called 'Hello Kitty'.
After the video provoked a backlash, including accusations of racism and cultural insensitivity, Lavigne played the "I have black friends" card, posting on Twitter:
RACIST??? LOLOLOL!!! I love Japanese culture and I spend half of my time in Japan. I flew to Tokyo to shoot this video specifically for my Japanese fans, WITH my Japanese label, Japanese choreographers AND a Japanese director IN Japan.
As Toshi Nakamura points out at Kotaku, the video isn't so much racist as lazy and unoriginal (and bad, so so bad):
If anything, the video feels like surface-layer self-indulgence of the more stereotypical Japanese image as perceived by a foreigner. Not racist – just shallow. It's like when someone discovers anime for the first time and becomes convinced that everything Japan and Japanese is superior. We all know someone who was/is like that, and to anyone who isn't in that phase or has grown out of it, such antics are quickly tiresome.
Arguably, Lavigne's 'Hello Kitty' isn't as bad as Gwen Stefani's creepy use of the Harajuku Girls as ethnic props, but it's in the same ball park. At least Stefani produced some decent pop tracks while she was at it, Lavigne's latest is on par with Patrice Wilson-produced Grace Liu or Alison Gold.
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