I have been watching the latest culture war flimflam unfold, and it is depressingly predictable. A Reform MP gets herself in a lather because adverts dare to feature Black and Asian people. Apparently this sight alone “drives her mad”, which is not exactly reassuring on the emotional stability front. Her defence is the usual guff about adverts not reflecting “ordinary Britain”, which is political code for “I am uncomfortable with visible diversity, so please hide it so I can pretend we are still in 1957.”
Then a study comes along that the right think proves their case. Channel 4’s Mirror on the Industry report shows representation in adverts is uneven. People of Black heritage appear in over half the adverts studied while they make up only around four per cent of the population. South and East Asian people are over-represented too. So yes, on one axis of identity, the pendulum has swung hard.
However, the same research shows disabled people, pregnant women, LGBTQ+ people and anyone over 70 are all shoved out of sight. Disabled people make up almost 18 per cent of the country and appear in just four per cent of adverts. Pensioners appear in only two per cent. That is erasure on a grand scale. A Britain whose most rapidly growing demographic is considered commercially invisible.
The MP in question has not complained once about that. Her outrage is laser guided at one thing alone. The presence of non white people. Not the absence of disabled people. Not the disappearance of the elderly. Not the fact that the advertising industry is petrified of showing anyone who looks like the average British consumer in a post office queue. Just melanin.
So let us be clear about what is happening. Advertising has made progress in one area and remains stuck in the mud in others. It is not a deliberate attempt to replace anyone. It is simply the industry doing what it always does. Chasing youth. Chasing aesthetics. Chasing a simplified idea of modern cool. And because of decades of absence, when inclusion for a few finally arrives, some viewers feel overwhelmed by the novelty.
Now the right are trying to rebrand their discomfort as a critique of “diversity washing.” That term does have a legitimate place. It is the sibling of greenwashing. Greenwashing is an oil company running an advert with a single wind turbine and a dolphin. Diversity washing is a bank running an advert with three photogenic minorities but a boardroom still run by men named Charles. In both cases, the glossy image hides the grubby truth.
And yes, advertisers are guilty of that at scale. Representation on screen improves while employment, pay and power structures remain firmly locked. Visibility without share of power is marketing theatre. It deserves to be called out.
But this MP is not asking for companies to employ more minorities. She is not demanding that disabled people or the elderly be given their fair share of casting or careers. She is not pushing for authenticity or seeking to end hypocrisy. She is irate because adverts sometimes show a Britain she does not like the look of. A Britain that actually exists.
Advertising has always been a cultural advance party. It reflects where society is going, not where a small, grumbling minority demand we freeze it. When people who were shoved to the edges are seen front and centre in a sunny kitchen making tea, the signal is simple. You belong here. You are part of the national story. That is what rattles the thin skinned. They want pretend Britain, where only they are visible.
So by all means, let us drag the ad industry out of its comfort zone. If they celebrate diversity in public, they must practise it throughout their organisations. Hire people. Promote them. Fund their creative decisions. Do not pretend the job is done because the cast in a washing powder advert look less like the attendees at a Rotary Club dinner.
What I will not do is indulge those who cry foul only when the visible change is racial. For them, diversity washing is a fig leaf. Their real grievance is that diversity is happening at all. That complaint has a name. We should stop dancing around it.
It is racism in a shiny new wrapper. Time to rip the wrapper off.
And here is the final irony. Most people hate adverts. They are white noise between the programmes we actually want to watch. We fast-forward them. We pick up our phones. We put the kettle on. The only people paying attention are those looking for something to be offended by. So if suddenly they are leaping from the sofa to shout at the television, the advertisers have accidentally become geniuses.
There is psychology at play. Diversity washing is not merely a lazy attempt to look modern. It is a provocation. It flushes out the ones who believe any representation beyond themselves is an assault. In the process, it reveals precisely who is terrified of Britain looking like Britain.
Perhaps the joke is on them.
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