A Russian sushi chain features an advertisement with a black man. A racist reaction ensues.

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The online ad that bounced off the Russian internet earlier this month was about a growing sushi chain opening dozens of restaurants across Russia: four smiling young people holding up chopsticks as they dig into bowls of noodles and seaweed and grab a plate of gigantic sushi and maki rolls.

Three of the people were women, apparently Russian. One was a black man.

Conservative activists immediately unleashed a campaign of hateful and racist attacks on social media and elsewhere, accusing the owner of spreading “multiculturalism propaganda.”

Now the owner of the channel, originally launched in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, is publicly apologizing – and in doing so, has added new fuel to a social debate in Russia over progressive ads in commercial marketing. .

The incident is the second in recent months involving a Russian company setting up a marketing campaign that ostensibly appears to embrace progressive values ​​- only to be ravaged by conservative critics.

The Russian government advocates multiculturalism, and President Vladimir Putin frequently cites the country’s multi-ethnic makeup: although Slavic Russians are by far the largest group, Tatars, Ukrainians and over 180 other recognized ethnic groups are part of the sprawling cultural makeup of the country.

But the state has also been reluctant to crack down on certain nationalist groups that peddle fanatic and often racist ideas.

In a column on the business site VC.ru, Konstantin Zimyen, the founder of the Yobidoyobi channel, said his staff were bombarded with hateful comments for the ad and another, featuring the black man posing alone.

Users of the Russian social network VK, he said, scammed him for supporting multiculturalism – a political idea rejected by many nationalists as a threat to Russian national identity.

Zimyen said some posters threatened him with violence and also posted his personal phone number online.

He told Russian media that he had introduced new security measures in his Krasnoyarsk apartment and that he planned to call the police. The company’s website, meanwhile, has come under hacking attacks, although Zimyen did not say if it was taken offline.

The chain, which started in 2016 in Krasnoyarsk, a city more than 1,700 kilometers from the nearest ocean, now has 57 locations in Russia and neighboring Kazakhstan — an indication of how Japanese cuisine is has adapted to Russian pallets over the past two decades in a significant way.

“Why in Russia in 2021 a black person angered some people is beyond me,” he wrote.

Just make it worse?

This is not the first such case in recent weeks, as a growing number of Russian companies come under pressure to follow the nationalist line.

In July, a health food chain called VkusVill withdrew an ad featuring an LGBT couple and apologized to its customers for what it called a “mistake that revealed the unprofessional nature of some. employees “.

VkusVill had been attacked for advertising by conservative activists, some of whom cited Russia’s controversial 2013 law, commonly known as the “gay propaganda” law.

After removing the ad, VkusVill was later lambasted by some customers for removing it and apologizing under pressure from homophobes.

The consequences for the LGBT couple have been far more serious: the two women revealed last month that they had left the country with their families, amid death threats from activists.

In Siberia, Yobidoyobi has elicited the same ridicule from people who denounce the campaign against his advertising as outright racism. The mixed messages from the company only made matters worse.

“On behalf of the whole company, we want to apologize for offending the public with our photographs,” the company wrote on Instagram. “We have removed all of the content that caused this uproar.”

But on its page on VK, the company framed its apology in clearer terms, specifically addressing ethnic Russians who may have been offended by the footage.

One of the most “liked” comments under the Instagram post came from a user who appeared to denounce the company’s decision to finally give in: “Welcome to the Dark Ages,” the user wrote.

Russian media reported that the hate campaign against the Yobidoyobi ad was started by Male State, a movement that advocates patriarchy and has already spoken out against feminists defending a domestic violence law.

Group leader Vladislav Pozdnyakov posted a screenshot of Yobidoyobi’s advertisement on his channel on the Telegram messaging app and encouraged its users to rip off the company by ordering and not paying for its sushi.

For his part, Zimyen said he had no plans to submit to the activists and would not remove the controversial ad, despite his apologies.

“Our food is for everyone. We do not intend to give up our principles and we urge everyone to be reconciled,” he told media Inc. Russia.

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