More on Mel and Kraft

Kraft's Mel the MilkBite Mascot Called Damaging, Racially Offensive By Local Petition

By Liz Miller

In February, Kraft Foods Inc. released an ad campaign to promote its new MilkBite milk and granola bars featuring a controversial mascot: Mel the MilkBite, a confused character who struggles with his identity as half-milk, half-granola product.

Commercials chronicled Mel's battles with dating, interacting with his book-club friends and confronting his "parents" (a glass of milk and a bowl of granola) with questions like, "You didn't think, did you? You didn't think what life was going to be like for me...Mom, Dad. For your son." Predictably, the campaign incurred ire for trivializing multiracial parentage -- it didn't pass the breakfast test, so to speak.

Recently, a human rights petition was launched by Michelle Parrinello-Cason of St. Louis through Change.org lobbying Kraft chief executive officer Irene Rosenfeld to end Mel's tenure as the MilkBite mascot. "These commercials perpetuate stereotypes that multiracial people are flawed, cannot form their own identities, and will never fit in," the petition read. "In addition, your commercials suggest that parents of multiracial children are irresponsible and are not concerned with their children's well being."
Is Mel the MilkBite as a mascot for a cereal bar a bridge too far?
Source: Riverfronttimes.com St. Louis

Racist Online Story reported by New York Daily Post

A Tea Party group in Kansas is coming under fire for comparing America's first multiracial president to a smelly, black-and-white pest.
This week, the Hutchinson-based Patriot Freedom Alliance posted a photo of a skunk next to President Obama, arguing the animal has replaced the eagle as the symbol for the commander in chief.
"It is half black, half white, and almost everything it does stinks," the group wrote.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People immediately blasted the post.
Darrell Pope, head of the local branch, told the Hutchinson News that the remarks were "a blatant statement of racism. It's intended to be malicious."
Thomas Hymer, who runs the website, defended the Obama reference, calling it "satire in a politically incorrect form."
But the image and text were taken down from the website on Monday.
Requests for comment from the Patriot Freedom Alliance were not immediately returned.
With News Wire Services