Tyler The Creator’s Mountain Dew Commercial Pulled After Criticism

Tyler The Creator seems to bring controversy with him everywhere he goes. He’s always saying and doing highly questionable things, but he has a lot of fans. PepsiCo wanted to take advantage of his large fan base, so they decided it would be a good idea to make a commercial with the 22-year-old rapper. The 60-second commercial Tyler created was pulled almost immediately after being released because it was full of racial stereotypes and downplayed violence against women.

The company seemed to have no idea that people would be so offended by the commercial, but once the criticism started to roll in, they pulled the plug on the commercial. So, why are people getting so mad about the commercial? Well, apparently the commercial showed a white woman who had clearly been beaten up. She was on crutches and staring right at a police lineup, trying to identify the man who beat her up. The lineup was full of black dudes, except for a goat that just so happened to be threatening the woman. “You better not snitch on a player. Keep your mouth shut.” the goat told the woman.

The woman couldn’t handle the pressure and ran away yelling, “I can’t do this” which is a play on Mountain Dew’s slogan, “Dew It.” Mountain Dew tries its best to appeal to the younger crowd, so they probably figured this kind of commercial would do well for their targeted audience. However, it proved to be just a little too “edgy” for everyone involved. A spokeswoman for PepsiCo stated that Tyler had the final approval for the commercial, but she could not comment on how big of a role PepsiCo had in the making of the commercial.  PepsiCo said in a statement,

 “We apologize for this video and take full responsibility. We have removed it from all Mountain Dew channels and Tyler is removing it from his channels as well.”

The spokeswoman for the company also revealed that the company learned people found the ad offensive when their consumer relations team told them. She also wants to make it clear that it was never intended to air on TV.

Mountain Dew is also facing criticism for their partnership with Lil Wayne. Consumers are demanding that the company cut ties with the rapper because of controversial lyrics in one of his songs. The outrage stems for a reference he made to Emmett Till, a 14-year-old boy who was tortured and lynched back in 1955 for whistling at a white woman. Emmett’s family has stated that they will pursue action to get Lil Wayne dropped from Mountain Dew.

Geez, can’t we all just get along? What is with all the hate and the anger? WHY CAN’T WE ALL JUST BE HAPPY? BE HAPPY, DAMMIT! Go take a walk, talk to your neighbors, make a new friend and share a glass of Mountain Dew together.