The below ad from Gap is gaining buzz for plenty of reasons. First off, a toddler boy is called “The Little Scholar” in the Gap ad, with a photo of Albert Einstein on his shirt — ironically misspelled as “Albert Einstien” on the front of the shirt designed to praise the wearer’s smartness. The “little Einsteins” at Gap who wrote the ad and misspelled the Einstein name are being blasted on social media for a variety of reasons.
Meanwhile, people are mad because the little girl’s copy in the Gap ad chalks the girl up to being only “The Social Butterfly,” without mentioning her smart brain. The irony of the boy being called the brainiac with a misspelled T-shirt isn’t lost on folks tweeting about the tone-deaf Gap ad.
As reported by Business Insider, people have taken to Twitter to voice their complaints.
Instead of praising the boy’s scholarly skills and reducing the girl to a social butterfly — perhaps Gap writers should have reversed the roles — and spelled Einstein’s name correctly.
It’s not the first time that Gap has courted controversy over their ads. As seen in the below tweet from the Huffington Post, an earlier Gap ad was called to the carpet because of the way it displayed the one African-American child in the ad. As can be seen in the Gap ad, the black child was seemingly used as furniture or a prop piece — according to some who viewed the Gap advertisement as racist — due to the way another child rests her arm on the girl’s head.
https://t.co/ZfMjDyfVS8 Gap ad had backlash due to a black girl featured in the ad being used for an “armrest” by white girl #fresheyes
There have also been missteps in Gap ads that have had nothing to do with alleged racism or sexism. As seen in the below Gap ad as reprinted on the Twitter account of the Daily Mail, Gap was accused of failing for featuring a space shuttle from the 1990s with 1969 emblazoned across the front of the image.
These days, with so many more eyes upon Gap ads and advertisements in general due to the viral nature of social media, it could help to have a large array of eyes upon ads prior to them making it out to the general public. Also, the reaction to various ads will also vary, based upon who is viewing the ad.
Whereas some folks might not consider the above Gap ads sexist or racist, others will.
The reaction on social media to the latest Gap ad faux pas has brought reactions from both old and young. As seen in the above tweet from the Twitter account of Tom Chivers, he received an email from an 11-year-old girl who praised him for his article about the so-dubbed sexist Gap ad.
[Photo by Lynne Sladky/AP Images]Some of the other reactions that people on social media are having to the latest Gap ad controversy — which stemmed from a Gap ad in the U.K. that has traveled around the world — can be read below.
“I actually like them both, put the girls in the boy’s shirt if it’s that big of a deal.
“Can we just appreciate play on words? We might get a ‘social butterfly’ shirt just to make waves. The real problem here is the misspelling of ‘Einstein.’ ?#?gotirony??#?stilllovegap?
“Oh boy, can’t wait to hear customers make comments about this at work.”
Job applications for the Gap Factory Store [Photo by Wilfredo Lee/AP Images]
“Walked through Old Navy yesterday. Girls? Minnie Mouse, Peppa…Boys? All the cool s*** my daughter would want: Paw Patrol, Star Wars, sports. WTF… No matter what one may say it’s taken out of context or a person hears it differently than what the speaker intended. So many get offended anymore. Now people are offended because a lil boys caption on Gap ad says scholar and the lil girl’s is social butterfly?! What have we truly become? It’s an ad for school clothes not a sexist ad! Good grief if that’s all people have to do is read into things they see hear and put their own spin on it than see it as it is, our world is sadder than first thought.”
[Photo by Mark Lennihan/AP Images]
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