Where were you before the world changed? When violence, harm and suffering were rife around the world. When millions of lives were lost in catastrophic global events. Do you remember?
It’s difficult to think back to a BKJ (Before Kendall Jenner) existence, prior to the world peace and harmony and mass outpourings of kindness caused when she handed a can of Pepsi to a police officer. Not only did everybody “Join the Oconversation.” The guards stood down. Police brutality was no more. Global injustice ended in an instant.
Join the Oconversation! pic.twitter.com/d8a5PMG5cS
— Kelvin Yu (@InternetKelvin) April 5, 2017
The Internet has exploded with reactions to Pepsi’s unbelievably misguided, ‘tone deaf’ new advert, in which Kendall Jenner leaves a model photoshoot, joins a protest, smears off her lipstick in order to ‘get real’, picks out a can of Pepsi that’s for some reason lying around in an ice box (never start a protest without some refreshments) and limply hands said Pepsi to a police officer. He gives a knowing ‘maybe we shouldn’t teargas these fuckers’ look to his fellow officers, and a previously irate photographer makes sure she captures Jenner’s passing of the Pepsi, thus creating the most iconic protest photograph since Tank Man boldly stepped in front of tanks in Beijing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCEm21aTh5Q&t=52s
Clearly, all it took was a can of Pepsi to solve a crisis. And as a result, a new meme has emerged, begging Kendall to please give these brutal police officers a god damn Pepsi.
"Kendall please! Give him a Pepsi!" pic.twitter.com/pO1PTYkCHW
— Giugliano (@antonioscastles) April 5, 2017
"Kendall please, give him a @pepsi!" pic.twitter.com/z0zgdnFlD9
— Hotetoko (@ThabileMpe) April 5, 2017
Others have responded in slightly less bleak terms, attempting to imagine how on Earth this concept was ok’ed by so many marketing heads.
Whatever happens today, just remember it could be worse.
You could be the global marketing director of #PEPSI
— The All New Dom Show (@TheNewDomShow) April 5, 2017
Pepsi's marketing team getting fired tomorrow morning
— Michelle (@michnavarro_) April 5, 2017
https://twitter.com/IAmPhillyC/status/849496452053299200
https://twitter.com/ziwe/status/849420816135671808
Try and envisage this being conceived during the Mad Men age of advertising.
don draper: *points to hippie girl putting flower in gun* this, but with pepsi
peggy: are you sure
don: peggy i am going to Heal Racism— mike pence's first wife, lilith (@jon_snow_420) April 4, 2017
In the Mad Men reboot, the series ends with Don Draper getting fired after creating the Kendall Jenner Pepsi ad
— Jarrett Carlen (@JarrettGC) April 5, 2017
Some have pointed out how The Chemical Brothers already thought this up decades ago.
https://twitter.com/ashleylynch/status/849476579273134083
But at least it’s good to know we finally have a catch-all solution for every problem.
When you killed someone but you have Pepsi at home pic.twitter.com/HsA8vcftBD
— Dan Ndu (@AltBeing) April 5, 2017
But they don't know I'm carrying a Pepsi on me pic.twitter.com/o3bTEWfg4u
— ✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨ (@merelynora) April 5, 2017
So when Frank Ocean said "RIP Pepsi" on Nikes he was just predicting the future?????
— Lito Uzi Vert (@CzarIito) April 5, 2017