Adidas Twitter Posts Racist Tweets About Arsenal Jersey Kit

Adidas is under fire after its social media campaign to promote Arsenal’s newly unveiled jersey ended up transmitting abusive, racial and anti-semitic messages to nearly one million of its followers.

The Adidas UK’s campaign, #DareToCreate coincided with the release of the new Arsenal home kit. The Twitter campaign’s core message was “This is home. Welcome to the squad.

In the #DareToCreate campaign, anyone who tweeted or liked the company's promotional tweets would receive an artificial intelligence aided automated reply with photos of Arsenal jersey with the user’s Twitter-handle imprinted on the back with a link offering the source from where it can be purchased.

But the campaign was usurped by trolls whose users deftly changed their account handle to broadcast abusive content.

The bot supported campaign turned offensive with repeated tweets coming from the Adidas account with pictures of the jersey dipped in racist and offensive slogans.

The offending trolls were referring to sports tragedies like Hillsborough in which nearly 100 people were crushed to death in a stadium and also about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, a British child in 2007.

Some tweets were racist and anti-Semitic such as @GasAllJewss, @MadelineMcCann, and @96wasnotenough @innocent Hitler with barbs against Arsenal.

Twitter is investigating

According to a spokesperson for Adidas, there was an abuse of a Twitter personalization mechanic that was created to enable excited fans to get their name on the back of the new Arsenal jersey.

But a small minority misused it and created offensive versions of it. The functionality was turned off and Twitter is investigating.

The incident also brings back memories of similar botched up campaigns by companies that were hijacked by online vandals.

One example included the Twitter campaign of the New England Patriots in 2014 that led to vulgar names getting branded on the back of the NFL team's jersey.

British snack company Walkers had to tender an apology after its Twitter account sent out auto-generated pictures of its brand ambassador and soccer star Gary Lineker flaunting images of serial killer Harold Shipman and Jimmy Savile who was accused in a sex scandal.

In a statement, Arsenal football club said it condemns the abusive language which has “no place in our game or society.”

Arsenal added that the club owes a reputation to diversity and inclusion through a decade-long program Arsenal for Everyone as a celebration of the diversity of the Arsenal family.