A Sportspark UEA advertising campaign has been called racist by students who pointed out it could appear to be ranking individuals based on race and gender.
The Bronze plan, which is the cheapest at ÂŁ5 a month, shows a black woman, the second cheapest Silver plan shows a white woman with grey hair, and the most expensive Gold plan shows a tanned white man.
Dr Tori Cann, a lecturer in Humanities, brought the branding to the attention of scholars and students in a tweet earlier this month.
âMummy, what is intersectionality?â pic.twitter.com/pYRo82RU71
— Tori Cann (@_canndo) January 2, 2018
The official UEA Sportspark account responded promptly to students expressing distaste towards the image. They said the âcampaign has not ranked membersâ and they have had âminimal comments about any of our membership advertising in the past.â
A Sportspark spokesperson told Concrete: âSportspark is an inclusive community and we welcome everyone, regardless of gender, race, disability or religion.
“We are disappointed that some customers have interpreted this piece of our advertising as discriminatory, this was completely unintentional.
Hi Tori, we are sorry you feel this way, we will be sure to raise it with our advertsing company to ensure future campaigns can't be misunderstood.
— Sportspark (@SportsparkUEA) January 2, 2018
“This campaign imagery was released eight years ago to display our membership options. The campaign was part of a major rebrand of our logo, marketing collateral and strapline. We have taken all comments on board and will bear them in mind for future campaigns.â
One student told the Sportspark to âGet your act togetherâ on social media, whilst others said they were confused the branding had ever been approved.
UEA Feminist Society criticised the leaflet’s images.
They said: “The Sportspark leaflet is rightly under scrutiny – it raises serious questions. Firstly, why did their marketing associates think it appropriate to use a photograph of a black woman to represent the most affordable membership, and a white man to represent the most expensive?
“All parts of UEA ought to be inclusive and diverse, and indeed the SU has endeavoured to make sports more accessible. The message of this leaflet is entirely contrary to these goals – it is exclusionary and reinforces offensive stereotypes of gender and race.
“UEA Feminist Society call on Sportspark management to take responsibility for the distribution of this leaflet, and to reflect on how it was approved.”
SU Activities and Opportunities Officer Cam Koosyial said: âWhilst the SportsPark have assured us that the obvious problems with this leaflet were unintentional, the research says that marketing matters- and the issue does remind us of some of the inequalities around sport and physical activity at UEA.”
Ms Koosyial said some students face issues when trying to access UEAâs sports facilities. âPart time often mature students donât get proper student memberships, postgraduate and placement students struggle to access supposedly âstudent friendlyâ times.
“Women and BME students are much less likely to get involved,” she said.
âThatâs why weâve been lobbying for a proper inclusion plan as part of the forthcoming UEA Sport Strategy so that all of us can benefit.â
The Sportspark said there were no plans to change or discontinue the advertising campaign at present. However, a spokesperson said they would âcontinue to listen to feedbackâ.
Comments
5 responses to “Students slam “racist” Sportspark branding”
The irony is that the leaflet was probably originally 3 different white men and then just as it was going out the door someone was outraged that there was no “diversity” on the leaflet and so they hurriedly put on a couple of women making sure one of them was old and one of them was black and then they all had a group hug about how they had dodged an SJW bullet.
Exactly – why isn’t there a disabled person up there, or someone with a facial disfigurement? or…..or……
What about ageism? The women representing the bronze membership is evidently younger than the other two? Does this suggest that only elderly citizens can afford better memberships? Also, can one extrapolate from this that minorities should only ever be seen representing quality membership options? Will this then gloss over the actual disadvantage they face in society? How can one win here?
People have lots of time on their hands at UEA.
What he/she said (above) – Preach!! Oh no, shoud I include a gender neautral reference in case the person who posted the comment is gender fluid? Snowflakes please get a life and stop being offended by absolutely everything. There are no Indian people on that leaflet, no Sikh, no Jewish! No gingers! OMG!
Fuck me. The only people offended by this are the crazies who spend their lives trying to find things to be offended about.
No matter how the images are arranged you could come up with some ridiculous reason why it’s discriminatory.
Why are men so under-represented in this image? There are two women but only one man – sexism is at work here. Clearly this was designed be a feminazi who hates men that had no choice but to drop in a token privileged straight white male.