"New Face of Ferrero" competition - only white children should apply?

[RedApple11]

Just bought a pack of Ferrero treats for my DD and was shocked at what looks like a blatantly discriminatory campaign. The new "Faces of Ferrero" (ie, the winning children whose images will be used to promote Ferrero products) are all white and fair featured. Five boys, one girls. Are only fair white children attractive enough to be the Face of Ferrero then?

I contacted Ferrero about this and was told:

"We would like to stress that the competition was judged purely on the basis of the children's responses to the question which was: "what they want to be when they grow up and why?".

So I investigated further and discovered that actually, what a crock that was. In fact, all entrants were required to upload their children's photos in order to have a valid entry and these images were then displayed in a gallery. See www.faceofkinder.com/terms.php and scroll down to section 9.3 which states:

"The photograph must have been taken within the last 6 months before it is sent as an entry in the competition. The child must be fully clothed. Whilst entrants may crop and enlarge photographs, they must not submit a photograph which has been substantially altered. By entering into the competition, the entrant agrees that the promoter can visit the child to check that the photograph is an accurate representation of him or her. No changes will be permitted to photographs accepted into the Gallery after the voting period opens on 30th May."

Anyway, the wonderfully white and photogenic winners can all be found here: www.faceofkinder.com/gallery.php

Don't get me wrong, these kids are all gorgeous and this isn't sour grapes - I had no idea about this competition and wouldn't have entered my DD into it anyway.

That said, I think it's outragous that in this day and age, a company like Ferrero can get away with promoting the idea that only fair white children are attractive enough to be the Face of Ferrero. This seems wrong on so many levels.

Look, your child didnt win because he / she clearly wasnt as 'attractive' as the ones that did win.

Deal with it and move on FFS instead of taking the piss out of actual real life racisim.

RedApple11 I've never heard a person put so much effort into disliking a group of children before.

Actually starting to freak me out how much energy you seem to have spent investigating these little ones and the competition they have won (weldone to them).

Get a grip. There are real racism issues out there...go and spend your energy fighting for them and knave the kids to their kinder eggs

Blimey they're hardly the start of a new master race are they? They have dark hair and freckles, and everyfing.

"I'm simply pointing out that we have a huge kids brand here who is actively promoting a message that white is beautiful. In this day and age, really? That's ok?"

If that was the case then no, it wouldnt be ok.

But thats not the case.

Lets just chuck in a 'token black kid' so we look politically correct.

YABU.

Point one: Public voting via the website will determine the top 50 finalists based on the children with the highest number of votes.

So the public cut out 4950 entrants.

Point two: The top 50 finalists as voted for via the website will be judged by a panel of judges who will decide the 6 winners. At least one of the judges will be independent of the promoter.

The judging criteria will be based on the child's response to 'What do you want to be when you grow up?' and their reason. The creativity and uniqueness of response will form the basis of the judging criteria. For the avoidance of doubt, it is the creativity of the reason that will be the judged element.

Y'know, I bet it would really sucks for the families of the six winners to see aposts saying, "your child isn't creative- they just won because they're white" and I think singling out an individual child's entry for criticism just now was Bad Form.

I'll tell you what would annoy me.

If I had a child with a life limiting illness who would never grow up.

They cannot enter the competition. Regardless of their skin colour.

They look fairly ordinary kids to me, not unusually 'beautiful'. Not that there's anything wrong with that! I really don't get how publishing slightly blurry photos of normal-looking kids who won a competition and happen to be Caucasian (as is the vast majority of the UK population) is promoting a 'white is beautiful' message .

I think you need to let it go and admit you over-reacted, OP. This is getting a bit silly.

Bad form Jessie? nah, just good ole fashioned jealousy. Sure OP you didnt enter your DD

So why the photo upload if it's about creativity?

They're just kids, none of them are stunners imo.

You're talking out of your arse btw.

All they have to answer to the question is "I would like to be an Ambassador so I can spoil people."

Sure fire winner.

I'm off to coach DD for next year.

Vertbaudet run children's competitions. Children send in their designs, and the winning ones get made into clothes. The children then model the items.

Sometimes the younger children tend to look cross, and I like to imagine it's because their designs have been improved altered.

Where's the sock puppet? Why no sock puppet.

The photo upload (as has been said before) is to show that it is a child entering and not 55 year old Dave

They need to upload a photo OP so that it's clear they are CHILDREN and not a 57 year old hairy handed trucker called Dave.

And Ferrero's corporate site just features white people because just white people work in corporate organisations. Thank you for showing me the error of my ways. Of course there's no discrimination here. This is a possitively equal opps brand. The photo upload requirement in this competition wasn't a factor at all.

"A famous chef so I can make my signature dish." Very creative answer. Well done. Must be coincidence that you're very cute with freckles.

Are you still battling on alone in your beliefs? Doesn't it count for anything that not a single person on here agrees with you.

Arrogant much.

So now they're promoting 'freckles are beautiful'? :)

Seriously, you're winding us up, aren't you?

I went on to the FaceofKinder - it's all all white kids on the homepage.

Stop picking on that one little child!

It's foul behaviour.

I have freckles, do you think I'm beautiful op?

What was your daughters answer redapple?

You know what OP you're actually right.

Fuckers, with their blatent racism. White and MILK chocolate, how they sarcastically put the milk chocolate on the outside = darker colour is an OUTSIDER = black people are OUTSIDERS = racism HMMMMMM???