Snapchat Releases, Then Pulls, ‘Yellowface’ Selfie Filter ⇥ theverge.com

Kwame Opam, at the Verge:1

Just four months after causing outrage over a similarly offensive selfie lens, Snapchat has incurred the wrath of its users by enabling what many see as, effectively, a yellowface lens. According to Mic, users called out the social platform on Twitter yesterday, saying the lens caused people’s faces to look like racist Asian caricatures.

That’s pretty racist. How this made it through an internal review process to be released publicly is a mystery to me — Snapchat hasn’t released their employee diversity stats. I’ve reached out to ask if they plan on doing so, and I’ll update my annual survey should they come through.

  1. While this story originated at Mic, they have autoplaying video ads and full-screen takeover subscription prompts. Why would I want to subject you, dear reader, to that madness? ↥︎