H&M Blasted for Having Black Child Wear ‘Coolest Monkey in the Jungle’ Sweatshirt

Wow, H&M. Just… wow.

The clothing giant is rightfully under fire for using a black child to model a sweatshirt sporting the phrase “coolest monkey in the jungle.”

Yes, yes, they did. The ad is, at best, insensitive and, at worst, egregiously racist.

The hoodie, available at the store’s United Kingdom page as a “printed hooded top,” was noticed Sunday by social media users.

I’m sure the apologies are a coming. And the ads will be pulled. I’m certain there will Be media fixers and whatnot and maybe a grand gesture like a donation to some charity (donations under these circumstances are the corporate version #SomeOfMyBestFriendsAre move if there ever was one) all this tells me about @HM is that the seats in the boardroom lack something…wanna take a guess?

A post shared by Questlove Gomez (@questlove) on Jan 8, 2018 at 5:42am PST

H&M, based in Sweden, did indeed an apology — albeit a terse one — on Monday morning:

“This image has now been removed from all H&M channels and we apologise to anyone this may have offended.”

I used to work in marketing and know the endless departments, people and channels this ad likely had to pass through before being approved, and it’s hard to believe not a single person thought to point out, “Hmmm. Perhaps that’s not appropriate?”