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03 April, 2011

A Delicious Bag Of Crunchy, Salty Bigoted Lulz

Back in 2008, UK supermarket chain Tesco redesigned their tortilla chip packaging to feature an over-the-top Mexican "bandito" character as a representation of their various chip flavors.  Every so often, someone "rediscovers" the design and posts a photo or two on the web, usually with some variant of a "holy shit is this really real?"-type comment.

The UK has fewer than 1 million Hispanic residents, which is probably why the package hardly ever stirs up more than a brief WTF and shake of the head.  After all, here in the US, where the number of Hispanic people is approaching 50 million (about 16% of the total US population) we wouldn't think of using such a blatantly offensive stereotype to sell a few bags of chips.

Frito-Lay
Well, we probably wouldn't use such a blatantly offensive stereotype to sell a few bags of chips, now that Frito-Lay has sent the Frito Bandito off into retirement.

Oh, wait, there's Mi Ranchito tortilla chips with Señior Pancho on the front.  I found these at Big Lots last Saturday.

Señior Pancho??  Seriously?
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2 comments:

  1. Anonymous03 April, 2011 10:14

    I say bring back the Frito Bandito!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous04 April, 2011 19:34

    I lived in England for a year abroad in college in 2009--I saw this bad boy at Tesco every time I shopped. Oh, racial stereotypes. Good on you, Tesco. Good on you.

    ReplyDelete

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