Forever 21 apologizes for insensitive Black Panther post

Forever 21 missed a step in its marketing decisions. The fast fashion retailer recently removed a photo from its social media and website after consumer responses indicated that Forever21 chose the wrong race in its model.

The photo in question depicted a Caucasian male modeling a knit sweater featuring the words “Wakanda Forever” in its design. Forever 21 products often feature pop culture references and imagery or wording related to recent films and TV shows. This particular item refers to the Marvel franchise “Black Panther,” a comic book-turned-film series based around the character T’Challa, the leader of the futuristic, fictional African nation of Wakanda who is also a superhero under the identity of the Black Panther.

After Forever 21 posted the image of its choice of model in the “Wakanda Forever” sweater on Twitter, users responded critically. Tweets in protest carried messages including, “Not even Wakanda can escape gentrification,” and “A Wakanda Forever Fair Isle knit sweater modeled by an Eminem lookalike [sic] just makes no sense whatsoever, and it's insulting. @Forever21 is canceled.”

Forever 21 removed the photo soon after, and removed additional photos of the same model and product combination from its website. The sweater is still available on the ecommerce site, with a single image of it, sans model.

"Forever 21 takes feedback on our products and marketing extremely seriously," the company told E! News. "We celebrate all superheroes with many different models of various ethnicities and apologize if the photo in question was offensive in any way."

Brands are still learning sensitivity around racial portrayal

Forever 21’s misstep in this marketing decision comes less than a week after luxury brand Prada received backlash due to a racially insensitive accessory item in its stores. Prada’s critics pointed out that the design of a charm was quite similar in appearance to imagery that was birthed out of racism and is still offensive today.

In Forever 21’s case, the brand created a product that celebrates a character that represents one of the few superheroes in a minority demographic. While the product was well-intentioned, the brand learned quite quickly the importance to consumers that a positive message is carried out, from start to finish. And that includes social media marketing imagery.

Photo: Forever 21 website