In 2018, I decided to create an Instagram page to celebrate Australian women of colour (AWOC). I was tired of the thin, blonde hair, blue eye image of Australian women. In 2020, I had slowly begun to realize why there were so few women of colour to spotlight. WOC were simply not being heard. I had begun receiving messages from WOC around the country talking about how daily life was ripe with racism, from the workplace to the foundation counter. I could relate.

After the murder of George Floyd and the global uprising of Black Lives Matter, I began calling out whiteness in advertising. Pretty much every fashion and beauty brand in Australia had zero diversity across their digital marketing. I took screenshots of social feeds from Witchery to Kookai to showcase the whiteness. Instantly, I was labelled as disruptive and a troublemaker. “It’s not racist if they have a person of colour”, I was promptly told by POC and white people alike. We started a campaign pushing for brands to be more diverse and sure enough, big brands ‘pulled’ up including Vogue Australia and Jurlique.

By this time, I was on everyone’s radar. And suddenly the hate started to flow. I then heard from friends in the industry that a certain stylist (whom I did not know) was emailing snapshots of disparaging direct messages from my account. I was shocked — is this a thing? Do people actually make up DMs? This was before the Chrissy Teigan / Michael Costello drama. This was the start of a campaign by him (the stylist) and his associates to “take me down”. One of them (a woman of colour and so-called influencer, let’s call her ‘bad juju’) started a page to troll me and continued for over a year. Yep, over an entire year. She followed industry professionals, talked crap about me to whoever would listen… it went on and on.

Did I make mistakes along the way? Absolutely. Anyone who actively speaks about anti-racism publicly knows apologizing is part of the fight. But photoshopping DMs about colourism (already a sensitive topic for POC) and creating lies about who I am as a person, my work and even my ethnicity? That’s on a whole other level. White supremacy was doing its work thanks to POC. Again, nothing new here. This is how systemic racism works. It can’t survive without certain POC co-opting it. It was just odd being a target.

You’re probably wondering why I just didn’t stop. Well, the first time it happened I contacted a lawyer. The press were picking up the story of photoshopped messages and I naively thought I could move past it. Also, the photoshop was so bad, I seriously doubted anyone in their right mind would believe it. I had a cease and desist issued to media who agreed, except for Pedestrian TV which only much later, despite evidence and a potential defamation case, only agreed to change the headline. Go figure.

It was the reactions that were perhaps the most shocking and took some time to process. I stopped giving a damn about the trolls and haters — after all, they are great motivation to keep going! But the responses from well-intentioned allies were something else.

The woman (‘bad juju’) involved in the troll campaign was Aboriginal and I am Fiji-Indian. I was told several times “in Australia if you aren’t white or First Nations, no one will believe you.” I was also told “South Asian women always get shitted on” and that “being disruptive will only bring you hate… like what happened with Yassmin Abdel-Magied and Ruby Hamad”. It was all heartbreaking and, sadly, true. I didn’t see the point in fighting a fight I couldn’t win, even if I was telling the truth.

But I’m also very stubborn. Take it from someone who ran away from home as a teenager and lived in NYC for 20 years on her own, it is very hard to break me, as my trolls soon found out. I have since changed the ‘AussieWOC’ Instagram account to ‘Unlearning Shit’ and I continue to speak up and take up space on topics such as fast fashion, climate change, and anti-racism.

Here’s the thing I’ve learned in the last year. If you speak up, and you’re a woman, you will be called toxic, bitter, aggressive, and a bitch. If you are a woman of colour, be prepared. You’ll be lucky if anyone gives a damn how you feel, including other WOC who — because of the scarcity mindset — feel threatened by your voice. Simply put: they wish they could do what you do. White people aside, be careful of whitewashed POC who will defend white supremacy when you speak up. Unpack, unlearn and keep going.

Thankfully, through it all, I’ve managed to build a pretty amazing community of like-minded folks and I’m really proud we were able to give the industry a much-needed wake-up call. I’m thankful to the people who turn up every day on @unlearningshit to challenge our collective thinking and in turn have made me stronger. We’re changing Australia together, even if it is on Instagram.

This week ‘Karen’ made national news in Australia after a white woman complained of having to wear a mask and ‘asked for the manager’. The media drew similarities to ‘Karen’ memes on social media, but that wasn’t the worst of it. The new story opened up the flood gates of ignorance, taking a turn for the worst when white women named Karen started campaigning to ‘reclaim the name’ and celebrate ‘good’ Karens. Even Dominos Australia offered them free Pizza to make them feel better.

The entire spectacle made me sick. The oppressors were acting like the oppressed. Coincidently, I am currently reading ‘White Tears Brown Scars’ by Australian author Ruby Hamad about this EXACT same thing. The book explores ‘the inconvenient truths that when it comes to race, white entitlement is too often masked by victimhood. Never is this more obvious than the dealings between women of colour and white women.’

In case you’ve been internet detoxing, the term ‘Karen’ uses humour to describe a white woman using her privilege against people of colour, particularly black Americans. The ‘Coronavirus Karen’ is a new iteration of the stereotype. Refusing to wear a mask or forcing others to wear them is seen as ‘Karen’ behaviour.

Social media has had lots of fun stereotyping with names — ‘Basic Becky’, ‘Bye Felicia’. Yes, that’s right. It’s not just white names. But ‘Karen’ like ‘Carol’ before it, is rooted in something much more dangerous. It is when this behaviour becomes celebrated, and turns into reality, that it can cause real harm.

The meme where Karen is ‘calling the manager’ is referring to her using her privilege over a presumingly BIPOC worker to get them fired. It’s funny as a meme, sure, but anyone losing their job over white tears… is that still funny? What about losing their lives?

I saw a lot of comments of white women crying foul and saying, ‘This is so sexist! Why aren’t there any male equivalents?’. Sure, there’s been discussions of ‘Ken’ and ‘Chad’ but the truth is, when it comes to white men, we’ve always been aware of their violence and betrayal. From slave owners to President Trump. We see it and live with it every day.

But white women use their privilege and tears much more strategically, and it has violent consequences. There has been no justice for victims… up until now. Social media is also a powerful enough tool that while it can make light of a stereotype, it also brings awareness to the cause. Amy Cooper, the woman in Central Park who reported a black man for bird watching, is now being charged after the video of her calling the police went viral.

Unfortunately, however, we’ll never truly know how many lives have been lost due to white woman tears. The first one that does come to mind is Emmett Till. In 1955, a 14-year-old African-American boy named Emmett Till was brutally murdered after Carolyn Donham’s family was offended. In 2008 she admitted to lying about the encounter. Emmett Till would have been 79 on July 25.

Of course, this won’t be enough for many Australian white women. Australia has become a haven for white feminism — a sisterhood so deeply racist, it’s lost all sense of self-awareness. But what about all the ‘good’ Karens that now have to live with this, they’ll ask? My response is this: people of colour with non-white names have been joked about for centuries. So, no Karen, we don’t feel sorry for you. Live with it.

One might say they are the new Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. We say they just might be much more impactful duo.

Ryan Coogler has directed 3 movies. All featuring his friend and long-time collaborator Michael B. Jordan. Fruitvile station. Creed. Black Panther.

Each has been meaningful and artful. Entertaining and emotional. And highly profitable, with margins even Mark Cuban would wet his pants over. With only 3 films Coogler has sealed his fate as brilliant and bankable director.

Fruitvile Station told the story of the last 24 hours of the life of Oscar Grant, who was shot to death by a police officer at Oakland’s Fruitvale BART station on January 1, 2009. It won the Grand Jury Prize at 2013 Sundance Film Festival.

Creed successfully put the Rocky films back on the map after almost 10 years. Sylvester Stallone was nominated for an Academy Award while Jordan was unfairly snubbed. Hollywood wasn’t ready. But we were. It made $173.5 million on a $35 million budget.

However, all of this feels like a drum roll to what is now the 5th biggest opening of all time. Black Panther opened #1 in almost all markets predicted to take a whopping $361MM at the global box office this long weekend. Smashing records like Obama on a campaign trail.

All of these movies have more than Coogler and Jordan in common. They’ve pushed the culture forward… by leaps and bounds. And I’m not talking Black culture. I’m talking Today’s Culture.

We all know Hollywood in the midst of a shift. But it’s not called #MeToo or #BlackLivesMatter. It’s called Representation.

With the extraordinary success of Black Panther this weekend, we know why representation matters. Good for business and for people.

Representation in Hollywood. In corporate. In politics. In advertising. It matters.

We want to be represented. We want to relate. Great storytelling demands Representation. We are have entered an era where even brands need to tell good stories.

And if you want to get Representation right it requires… you guessed it… collaboration.

All the great artists were keen collaborators. From Andy Warhol to Notorious BIG. Anything that pushed culture forward was never achieved alone.

With Black Panther making history, Coogler and Jordan have once again showed us the power of collaboration. And we need that reminder now more than ever.

Who are your collaborators?

Most brands would run from partnering with an outspoken stripper-turned-rapper but not Amazon. While brands are being extremely careful about who they choose for endorsements, they are missing some of the biggest opportunities for social advertising. These diverse group of social heavy-hitters are creating culture, not just content.

There was a time when the ad world used to say “why do we need multicultural agencies?”. After realizing general market agencies were missing the mark with colored audiences, brands decided to invest heavily in creating custom campaigns for multicultural (MC) audiences.

In response, general market agencies integrated MC capabilities into their shops — or at least that’s what they told their clients. “You want to reach black people? We can do it!” But, unfortunately, over the years — with no real intention of making diversity a priority — this, too, became lost in the shuffle. And brands are paying for it.

Influencer marketing is a fairly new concept to the ad world. And once again we are using general market techniques to reach diverse and cultural audiences. Just because an agency has their finger on the pulse doesn’t mean they know the cultural nuances of the different demographics across social media.

Today we have frustrated consumers who brands don’t know how to speak to. Reach isn’t a problem; it’s the voice. Influencers are more than just social stars — they are content and culture storytellers. And if you want to reach these lucrative, diverse audiences, then chances are you need to diversify your agencies.