The idea that women of all races should love their hair may seem non-controversial. Forget that.
Shea Moisture, a brand long marketed primarily to African-American women, got a social-media smackdown Monday afternoon that made it the top U.S. Twitter trend with nearly 33,000 tweets as of 5 p.m. Tweets objected to new advertising that reaches out to white women and equates the "hair hate" they face to what black women experience. By 6 p.m., the brand had pulled the ad.
Commenters saw the ad as an effort by Shea Moisture to move away from its core consumers toward white women, some of whom are depicted in the 60-second video as using Shea Moisture products. A tweet by Nana Jibril, who describes herself on LinkedIn as a freelance social-media expert and former social-media manager at her alma mater Old Dominion, appears to have started things.