On Wednesday, we shared the disturbing news that Honey Nut Cheerios spokesperson, Nelly, recently shared his desire to violently assault the students of of Spelman College over their protest of his Tip Drill - mind you, the student protest took place almost a decade ago- He’s still mad.
“The Spelman thing, the only thing I feel I would’ve did different is kick somebody’s ass…that’s just how it felt to me, Pimp,” he said to host Marc Lamont Hill. “I don’t have my sister. And I doubt it if half of those girls are still campaigning for what they quote, unquote took advantage for that opportunity for.” Nelly at 4:27 of this HuffPost video
Nelly apparently forgot ( or just does not care) that General Mills is currently running a national television spot featuring Nelly and the Honey Nut Cheerios mascot, Buzz the Bee.
I didn’t even go into the wisdom of General Mills taking a family-friendly cartoon character and partnering with a hip hop artist with a catalogue of violent, sexually explicit lyrics and music videos -- that would be pointing out the obvious.
On Wednesday, I suggested that if you had a problem with General Mills spokespeople engaging in violence against women, you might want to let them know. Many of you emailed, called, faxed and some have even snail mailed.
I sent my letter via snail mail, fax and email. (my letter is posted at the end of this post). The snail mail letter was addressed to the CEO. Here is the response I received from Jennifer with Consumer Services:
Thank you for contacting General Mills. Your comments are important to our business.
Please be assured that we will share them with the appropriate individuals.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Garrett
Consumer Services
Thanks Jennifer! Many of you have shared stories of pleasant experiences on the telephone with General Mills customer service representatives assuring you that your concerns will be passed along to the marketing people. So we know for certain that General Mills KNOWS that their spokesperson is a violent anti-Black woman bigot running around spewing hate speech promoting violence against Black college women who dare to disagree with him- on their own college campus- that they paid tuition to attend.
So the obvious next question is now that they know what is General Mills going to do about this?
Logic and reason tell us that partnering a children’s cartoon character with a reckless, foul-mouth who hates a large segment of the Honey Nut Cheerios buying public and isn’t shy about saying so is not the smartest allocation of General Mills resources.
According to this article from General Mill’s hometown newspaper, General Mills is gearing up to run their first Cheerios ad during the Superbowl in 18 years.
If you haven’t contacted General Mills, please do so. Your new question might be, “Now that you KNOW you’re partnered with a violent misogynist, what are you going to do about it?”
As always, be polite to the poor customer services representatives- they aren’t the people who made this decision, that would be Scott Lee, Associate Director of Honey Nut Cheerios.
You also might want to ask if the CEO of General Mills, Kendall J. Powell, has ever seen Nelly’s Tip Drill video and whether he has any idea of what Nelly’s Pimp Juice lyrics and products are about?
Here is the contact info, followed by various letters WAOD readers have already sent:
The man responsible for partnering with Nelly is Scott Lee, the associate director of Honey Nut Cheerios.
The CEO of General Mills is Kendall J. Powell.
General Mills phone number: 1800-248-7310
General Mills Fax number: 1-763-764-8330
Mailing address:
General Mills, Inc.
P.O. Box 9452
Minneapolis, MN 55440
General Mills Online Contact Form.
General Mills Blog Post Celebrating Nelly collaboration. (LEAVE COMMENTS!)
Instagram Account promoting Nelly Collaboration.
Twitter Account Promoting Collaboration with Nelly
Here's my letter:
Kendall J. Powell
CEO, General Mills, Inc
P.O. Box 9452
Minneapolis, MN 5544
Dear Mr. Powell,
I am very disappointed at the recent comments of your Honey Nut Cheerios spokesman, Nelly. On November 12, 2013 in an online interview with Huffington Post Live, Nelly said that if he could go back in time, he would beat up a group of young women at Spelman College who wanted to discuss incredibly disturbing images of Black women in his video “Tip Drill.” In the video interview Nelly stated the following:
“The Spelman thing, the only thing I feel I would’ve did different is kick somebody’s ass…that’s just how it felt to me, Pimp,” he said to host Marc Lamont Hill.”
As a General Mills customer, I am deeply troubled that the public statements of Nelly are inconsistent with General Mills published marketing and advertising guidelines. Violence against women is an incredibly important issue and associating Honey Nut Cheerios and your cartoon bee mascot with a man who makes public statements about kicking young women’s asses is an insult to women and girls and the men and boys who love them.
Even if you choose to overlook his history of misogyny-ladened lyrics, his recent statements about beating up a group of college women should be enough to signal that he does not represent the values of General Mills.
Here is a link to his public statements about committing acts of violence against the students at Spelman College entitled Nelly Wanted to “Kick Somebody’s Ass” Over Spelman’s Protest of Tip Drill” :”http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/12/nelly-kick-somebody-ass-spelman-protest-tip-drill_n_4262503.html
Thank you for your attention to this matter. If you have any questions, I can be reached at XXX-XXX-XXXX.
Here are some letters from readers:
I love Honey Nut Cheerios; I often buy them for my family. Still, I am perturbed by Associate Director Scott Lee's decision to feature Nelly (and his music) as the new spokesperson for your project. Nelly has a disturbing history of disrespecting the personhood of black women. His, now infamous, "Tip Drill" video features Nelly and his friends sliding a credit card down the crease of a black woman's buttocks. This is the image I associate with Nelly, and now associate with your product. On November 12, 2013, Nelly threatened black women with physical violence on HuffPost Live. I now associate his threats with General Mills and recognize that your CEO, Kendall J. Powell, enthusiastically supports Nelly’s continued lack of emotional maturity.
I will no longer purchase General Mills products for my household. I am also empowered to share your dubious choices with my friends, many of whom are popular bloggers, academics, artists, and good old-fashioned stay at home moms. I will let them know that General Mills, Kendall J. Powell, and Scott Lee disregard the humanity of black women. In fact, I am going to cut and paste this particular letter directly onto Facebook.
Finally, my job entails giving lectures to large numbers of young people on a regular basis. I will be sure to consistently use General Mills and its blatant disregard for black women, heck, ALL WOMEN and its advertising choices as examples of what NOT to do in endearing trust between a corporation and its customers. Particularly when we women are the major decision-makers for household economics. WAOD Reader, K8dee16
and another from WAOD reader shlbshl
Kendall J. Powell, CEO
General Mills, Inc.
Number One General Mills Boulevard
Minneapolis, MN 55426
Dear Mr. Powell:
I was recently made aware of General Mills’ association with the rapper Nelly as part of a promotional campaign for the Honey Nut Cheerios line of products. I write to inform you why I find this particular association deeply problematic, and why, unless your company severs its relationship with Nelly, I will no longer purchase General Mills brand products.
In 2004, a group of students at Spelman College organized a protest against Nelly’s scheduled appearance at a campus bone marrow drive. At the time, Nelly’s sister, Jacqueline Donahue, suffered from leukemia. Their opposition to the presence of the rapper at the historically black women’s college was spurned by the exploitative, sexually explicit, deeply misogynistic imagery featured in the rapper’s “Tip Drill” music video. The young women challenged the rapper to appear in a campus forum to discuss the larger theme, typified in the artist’s “Tip Drill” video, of the pervasive racialized misogyny in rap and hip-hop music. Instead of appearing on campus and engaging with these young women, Nelly elected to forgo this opportunity, pull funding for the bone marrow drive, and cancel his appearance. Yet, because these young women and the larger student body were not unsympathetic to Nelly’s philanthropic cause, and contrary to his accusations, another bone marrow drive was held in his absence.
As you may know, Spelman College has a long and storied history of not only educating black and minority women, but of advocating on their behalf. The young women’s challenge to Nelly constituted nothing less than a full embrace of the most laudable of the institution’s core values. Unfortunately, to this day, Nelly chooses to remain obtuse and mired in anger about the role that his art and his actions played in the protest. On a recent edition of HuffPo Live, when asked to reflect on the incident, Nelly opined that, if given the opportunity to act differently, he would instead “kick somebody’s ass”.
It is the combination of both his stated desire to inflict violence on the young black women who organized the protest, as well as the totality of a body of work in which the rapper traffics in the degradation and hypersexualiztion of black women, that renders him unfit to represent a brand that touts itself as a “family friendly advertiser” and targets its products to children as young as 9 months old. It is my view that having Nelly in your employ as a spokesperson not only represents an implicit approval of the rapper’s threats of violence against black women, but enables him to further profit from a career, that at various points, has capitalized on misogynistic scourge. For your own edification, I urge you to view the artist’s “Tip Drill” music video as well as his recent appearance on HuffPo Live.
http://slack-time.com/music-video-2717-nelly-tip-drill
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/12/nelly-kick-somebody-ass-spelman-protest-tip-drill_n_4262503.html
Nelly’s recent public conduct belies that which is befitting of a corporate spokesperson, and I ask that he be released him from his duties to Honey Nut Cheerios and General Mills. It is my hope that you will see to it that this matter is resolved in a swift and decisive matter. Until such time, I am compelled to find alternatives for the General Mills products that I would otherwise regularly purchase for my home and pantry.
Sincerely,
cc: Scott Lee, Associate Director
Honey Nut Cheerios
And another with lots of links from Toyin:
I find it shameful that you have Nelly as a spokesperson for your brand.
Especially, as in the comments made in the articles below, he wanted to 'kick somebody's ass'
I'm pretty sure you would not have him as a face of your brand, if the women's college in question were white.
These comments were made recently, over an incident at Spelman, a decade ago. The black women at this college refused to have him present as he wouldn't adhere to his side of their deal. Which was to discuss his video at the time 'tip drill' when he came to do a marrow awareness for his sister. FYI - they still held the campaign, just without him
http://hellobeautiful.com/2013/11/19/spelman-protesters-to-nelly-we-were-hoping-youd-understand-the-broader-message/
I will mention to the mothers I know, to be aware, as well as other people i know. I'm sure word will spread.
Read at leisure:
http://www.whataboutourdaughters.com/waod/2013/12/4/honey-nut-cheerios-hate-black-women-and-girls-spokesperson-n.html
http://atlantablackstar.com/2013/11/19/former-spelman-students-respond-nelly-blaming-sisters-death/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/12/nelly-kick-somebody-ass-spelman-protest-tip-drill_n_4262503.html
Would love to hear about your letters and emails, post them in the comment or for my lurkers, you can always send to me via email using our comments form.