Otter hip enough without brands trying to act phat
If the viral backlash to the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s fat otter photo is “peak 2018” (as the Washington Post put it) I don’t want to know what will constitute peak 2019.
But I already do: ever more viral backlash to something ever more stupid, though what that could possibly be is hard to imagine. If you aren’t familiar with this week’s social media scandal involving a fat otter, allow me to explain. On Tuesday, the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California tweeted a photo of a very adorable, fat looking, 11-year-old sea otter named Abby, lying out on the aquarium floor.
It turns out, thanks to reporting by the Los Angeles Times, that Abby isn’t actually all that fat; she’s only one pound above the average weight of an adult female of her species. But she happens to look enormous in this particular photo, which is presumably why whoever is in charge of the aquarium’s official Twitter account decided to tweet the following caption alongside it: “Abby is a thicc girl What an absolute unit She c h o n k Look at the size of this lady OH LAWD SHE COMIN Another Internetism !” Bear with me. The aquarium’s tweet, which has since gone viral, references a series of internet memes and slang terms used to describe big women, and where “She c h o n k” is concerned, very fat housecats.
But it’s the former allusion that offended some people online because, according to Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, a physics professor and social justice advocate with a large Twitter following, the aquarium’s tweet (specifically the phrase “she thicc”) borrows from “AAVE,” African-American Vernacular English.
Prescod-Weinstein responded to the aquarium’s tweet, writing on the social network, “Please delete this tweet. It is offensive.” She also wrote, “I’m certain that @MontereyAq didn’t realize that they were basically comparing Black women to animals by using AAVE developed to talk about Black women’s bodies to describe an animal. But that’s pretty bad, MBA.”
The aquarium, whose management probably didn’t start their days expecting to be accused of racism via the fatshaming of a marine animal, repented almost immediately.
It tweeted out an epic apology. Here’s an excerpt: “Hey everyone. It has come to our attention that some of the references in this tweet are problematic and insensitive. We’re posting here in the thread so that people who have engaged with this tweet will join us in our learning moment. If our tweet alienated you, please know that we are deeply sorry, and that we offer our sincerest apologies. If you follow our feed, we often reference popular memes to talk about the ocean. In this case, the memes used had connota- tions we were unaware of until now…We need to do better.”
And yet, according to thousands of Twitter users who loved the offending post, the aquarium was doing swimmingly already — and anyone offended by the sea otter caption was obviously an overly sensitive, politically correct scold. Thus began the backlash to the backlash.
“Your original tweet made my day,” wrote one user. “But your PC apology is depressing. Seriously, can’t we all laugh at a rolly polly otter?”
Political correctness gone mad. Of course this is the obvious point to make and thousands are currently making it.
But the less obvious question we should be asking in light of this event isn’t “why are some people so sensitive,” but rather, “why the heck is an aquarium tweeting with the voice of a horny teenager?”
What does it say about our culture that in an attempt to attract people to the wonders of marine life, an aquarium has to write about a sea otter in a fashion that suggests it wants to go to bed with it?
To my mind, the problem at the heart of otter-gate is not political correctness. It’s the depressing reality that we’ve come to expect institutions and corporate entities to adopt distinct, funny and worst of all, “hip” voices on social media.
This scandal is one of our own making because we jump to reward brands, museums and charities with likes and retweets whenever they try their hand at internet humour.
Look at Wendy’s as a prime example. Numerous publications have praised the fast-food chain for its edgy social media presence (the burger chain is known to troll competitors like McDonalds on Twitter), giving props to a faceless corporation as they would an up and coming stand-up comedian.
Similarly, Netflix Canada got social points this month when it appeared to tweet a joke criticizing the provincial Conservative government.
Even Verizon racked up thousands of likes last year when it tweeted a Fifty Shades of Grey joke at the expense of competitor T-Mobile (“Nobody can hear your safe word when you’re on T-Mobile.”)
Clearly, Monterey Bay Aquarium is trying its own hand at this type of casual, edgy voice. But brands are brands and institutions are institutions. Do we really want them parroting popular culture — often really badly — and pretending to be our friends?
At the end of the day, they are bound to cross the line, offend somebody and walk their hipness back into sober corporate speak with a solemn “thank you for the learning opportunity.” It’s embarrassing. We should save them the trouble and quit applauding their every effort to appear “with it.” They aren’t.
Abby the otter, however, remains, super cute. She is an innocent in all of this.