Avril Lavigne’s Dumb ‘Hello Kitty’ Video Is Rife with Cultural Appropriation

thedailybeast.com ^ | Apr 27, 2014 | Amy Zimmer

[Berlin_Freeper]

While Avril could have portrayed Japan in a more nuanced, less stereotypical fashion, it’s not surprising that a song about making out at sleepovers has an inane and clichéd video.

Due to what we can only surmise is a rift in the space-time continuum, a blonde, ageless pop star has just released a Harajuku Girl-inspired music video rife with cultural appropriation. Apparently, Avril Lavigne's eyelids were entirely weighed down with eyeliner throughout the early 2000s—there's no other explanation for "Hello Kitty", Lavigne's new single and accompanying music video, which is essentially a carbon copy of Gwen Stefani's 2005 hit, “Hollaback Girl.”

Stefani was using Japanese girls as props, making blank faces at the camera, and repeating meaningless consonant and vowel combinations over a synthetic beat when Avril was still stealing her dad's ties and huffing glue in the bathroom of a Tim Hortons. Unfortunately, Stefani never found a way to trademark white girl insensitivity, meaning we all get to watch Harajuku history repeat itself. The critical response to Lavigne's new single has been swift and harsh—like its pop precursor, the video was condemned for its "pick and choose" approach to Japanese culture, which reduces an entire nation's vibrant aesthetic to sushi, bangs, and enthusiastic Fujifilm product placement.

[Mr. Blond]

You’re right, the Japanese are obsessed with western culture. From goth lolitas and rockabilly to Malcolm X hats. It’s called celebration, not appropriation.

[Drew68]

She made the video in Japan, with a Japanese director, Japanese choreographers, and Japanese extras, and she still gets accused of racism??

By people named Amy Zimmerman.

[Drew68]

Do any actual Japanese in Japan find any problem with this video?

Isn't it racist for white liberals to be the final arbiters on what racial minorities should find offensive?

[Constitution Day]

I can’t believe I watched all of that. It was like a bullet train wreck.