M’sian Used George Floyd’s Final Words to Promote Air Purifier; Got Called Out for Being Insensitive

2020 really hasn’t been a good year for Earthlings.

Global viral pandemic, forest fires, volcano eruptions, and countless more. Recently, add in the tragic death of George Floyd and the racial protests in the US to the list.

#BlackLivesMatter

If you’ve somehow missed out on the entire #BlackLivesMatter campaign going on, here’s an article for you to catch up on if you wish. But I’ll summarise it for you here too.

An unarmed black man called George Floyd was the latest victim of police brutality as an officer knelt on his neck for 9 minutes, causing him to die of suffocation.

His last words “I can’t breathe” echoed through the world and started campaigns and protests in the US to end police brutality and racism.

Even outside of the US, most people worldwide have started to reflect on their own country’s racism and pay respects to George Floyd.

Marketing Gone Wrong

Some businesses may seek to use this entire case to help build Marketing & PR by either helping to spread awareness or even make donations.

Nothing wrong with that at all since it’s ultimately still for a good cause, but there’s a very fine line one must not cross.

A Malaysian Facebook user called Angie Ng ended up crossing that fine line trying to sell her air purifiers.

In an attempt to boost her sales, she made use of George Floyd last words “I can’t breathe” to come up with “clever” taglines.

Needless to say, angry Netizens came pouring in.

She was reportedly defensive at first, claiming: “I think it’s oversensitive and I just want to stretch on the importance of good air quality.” and “I don’t understand why it’s so disgusting because that is the way he died and I just want to stretch the importance of air that’s all and I don’t understand why they are so angry.”

However, she has since deleted her post and put up a public apology instead.

Since she has posted a public apology and appears remorseful, I suppose we should refrain from cyberbullying her and choose to focus on the actually important matters.

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Fellow Cases of Insensitivity

She is far from the first case to commit tone-deaf marketing we’ve seen, though.

2 years ago when our beloved Inuka was put to sleep, a local retailer IUIGA tried to make use of the tragedy to sell a new white porcelain teapot series.

They then later clarified that all profits would be donated and they had never intended to profit off Inuka but simply wanted to pay their respects.

And then quite recently, on the same matter of #BlackLivesMatter, Miss Universe Malaysia 2017 made some disturbing less-than-bright comments – which weren’t even an attempt to sell anything.

Also, as compared to the previously mentioned cases, instead of posting a public apology, she has chosen to post a bunch of random pseudo-philosophical posts on Instagram.

… what?

But then again maybe we’re just not on her “level and state of mind”.