That influencer apology for the blackface photo felt like a business memo

I was scrolling through old apology videos and landed on one from a beauty guru who posted in 2020. She straight up said 'I apologize for any harm caused' instead of actually naming what she did, which felt super fake to me. Do you think vague apologies like that ever actually work or do people just move on because they have to?

1 comments

1 Comment

kai_burns7348m ago

Vague apologies usually feel hollow because they're designed to protect the person, not the people hurt. That specific "any harm caused" line shifts blame away from the action and onto the reaction, which is a cop out. But sometimes they do work in the short term because fans want to forget it happened. The ones that actually stick are where someone names the exact thing they did wrong and promises to change. Like when that one guy from the baking show came out and said "I dressed up as a stereotype in 2014 and it was wrong" instead of dancing around it. That kind of directness at least shows some self awareness, even if it's late.