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A Black Lives Matter activist in the U.K. has slammed breakfast foods giant Kellogg’s for using a monkey and “white boys” on cereal boxes, suggesting it was racist.
Fiona Onasanya, a former member of Parliament who was jailed for three months in 2019 after she was convicted of lying to the police about a speeding ticket, asked the company why it chose a monkey for Coco Pops, its chocolate-flavored cereal, but chose “three white boys” for Rice Krispies, its crisped rice cereal.
Onasanya, the former representative for Peterborough, revealed that she emailed Kellogg’s office in the U.K., but did not receive a reply.
She also tweeted to @KelloggsUK [which is not the company’s official Twitter account], saying: “… As you are yet to reply to my email – Coco Pops and Rice Krispies have the same composition (except for the fact CP’s are brown and chocolate flavoured)… so I was wondering why Rice Krispies have three white boys representing the brand and Coco Pops have a monkey?”
Her comments drew flak on Twitter, with several media users accusing her of being “offended at everything.”
A user pointed out that Snap, Crackle and Pop – the elvish mascots for Rice Krispies – also appear in the box for Cocoa Krispies, which are chocolate-flavored Rice Krispies. A reply to that tweet showed that Coco, the mascot for Coco Pops, is featured in the “white choc” flavor of the cereal.
Don’t forget this but she wont moan same product just different flavours pic.twitter.com/BoNuaOKuKN
— ste (@coldste) June 16, 2020
Another user said: “The monkey is called Coco. Remove the monkey and they are just called pops.”
People also ridiculed her allusion to the mascots as “white boys,” saying that the mascots are elves, with one person tweeting “Elves [lives] matter.”
In another reply to the tweet, a user dismissed Onasanya’s racist claim, saying that he never looked at the mascots as racists.
“Some of us can tell the real world from the imaginary one,” the user quipped.
Her comments even created a furor in the black community, which some users calling out the activist’s move as “embarrassing” and “ridiculous.”
I'M BLACK LEAVE KELLOGS ALONE!!! You are one of those black people that make the rest of us look bad. It's embarrassing. If they issue any sort of apologie I'll never ever buy from them again. Seeing all these black people go mental over everything is a joke!
— KatieAriesMoonScorpioMars (@KatieGuernseyCI) June 15, 2020
For former Marine Ben McBean, a war hero who lost his right leg during a tour in Afghanistan, the debate on social media caused by Onasanya’s tweet is a distraction to the real issues that plague the country.
“I’m trying to fight real racist human beings who are going to cause me and my family harm and change my son’s future … and you’ve got people fighting to get the monkey taken off Coco Pops cereal for God’s sake,” he said on Good Morning Britain. (Related: Farage to Breitbart: ‘I have never seen so many people scared to say what they think.’)
In an apparent dig to her critics, Onasanya brought up founder John Harvey Kellogg’s controversial beliefs on wellness, tweeting that “it would be remiss of me not to ask.”
In a statement, Kellogg’s said that it “stands in support of the black community,” adding the need to talk more about developing racial equality.
“We do not tolerate discrimination and believe that people of all races, genders, backgrounds, sexual orientation, religions, capabilities and beliefs should be treated with the utmost dignity and respect,” the company added.
Coco, the mascot in question, has been part of the Coco Pops brand since the 1980s, according to the food giant, and is part of the range of characters shown on their cereal boxes. The mascot has been an integral part of the brand, with it helping boost sales and increase brand profitability since it first appeared in boxes.
LiberalMob.com has more on the lunacy of the Left.
Sources include:
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