Africa Badge shouldn't mention jungle

[Krissy252]

I find the Africa Fitbit badge offensive and stereotypical.  There is a picture of two gorillas and it reads "It's a jungle out there, but that's not stopping you-because apparently you went bananas and walked the length of Africa!"  There is a misconception that Africa is just jungle.  South America actually has 49% jungle versus Africa's 16%.  Please stop playing into that Tarzan and Jane mentality.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[shipo]

@Krissy252, I read your post yesterday and didn't respond as any comment on my part would have been pretty snarky.  I ran it across it again this morning and have to ask, exactly who or whom is being offended?  The gorillas?

Yeah, still snarky, just less-so compared to what I would have written yesterday.  🙂

[LanuzaFitbit]

Hello and welcome to the Community @Krissy252! 

We'd like to thank you for taking the time out of your day to provide us with your feedback! We really appreciate it. Please do know that your comment is not going unnoticed. 

Other location where you can make your voice heard is our Feature Suggestions board. You can post your ideas there and have other users vote for it, or comment on it, to show their support.

Don't be a stranger! 

[Kate52]

Found the Africa badge description offensive - References to 'jungle' and 'bananas' is reminiscent of a 1950s comic book version of the complex continent.  Length of continent connected to miles walked is fine and a matter of fact and interest.  Please omit offensive wording and rewrite -

[LanuzaFitbit]

Hey @Kate52! Thanks for joining the Forums.

Thanks for taking the time to let us know about your concerns in regards to the badges. Please know that there is no intent to offend anyone through the lighthearted descriptions. 

Hope to see you around the Forums.

[LZeeW]

@LanuzaFitbit   I need to side with @Kate52 on this.  There are countless "lighthearted" actions that are very, very offensive.  Earlier this month, there was an incident at American University in Washington, DC, where bananas were hung from nooses in three areas on campus. 

For some, I'm sure this image goes beyond stereotypical to racist.

[LanuzaFitbit]

Hey @LZeeW!

As I mentioned before, all points of view are welcome. We truly appreciate the time that everyone takes to share their thoughts and ideas.

Hope to see you around too! 

[PureEvil]

While I can certainly see how it may be interpreted it that way, I'm not convinced that it's any more stereotyping than the icon for Japan or India, which portray a pagoda and the Taj Mahal respectively.  Both of those countries are misrepresented by those images.

Keep in mind that Fitbit wanted to display an icon that would convey 'Africa' and, with the possible exception of the actual map of Africa, I'd be hard pressed to find an image that I may fit into an icon that conveys Africa without making references to wilderness.  Do a quick web search; the vast majority of images of the map of Africa, but the few others are ones of wilderness.

As to why gorillas?  I suppose they might've picked other animals (elephant, lion, or zebra, for instance), but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

[CarlosCFitbit · Accepted solution]

Everyone -- Thanks for all the feedback. We've decided to make a change. Our Product team will be updating the badge with a new design and congratulatory messaging. We are currently assessing design ideas and don't know what the badge will look like at this time. 

In order to ensure the best possible experience for our customers, we need to test any changes. For this reason, I can't give you an exact timeframe for when the new badge will be implemented, but rest assured this change will go into effect soon. We appreciate your patience.

More to come!

[Kate52]

Very glad you will be changing this shortly- Kate

Sent from my iPhone

[Kate52]

Dear Carlos C, Fitbit moderator, and All,

Thank you for redesigning and rewriting Africa badge.  Part of the problem is that people have often viewed and spoken of Africa as a monolith.  It is as if you had only a Europe badge, or an Asia badge--for which it might be difficult to fix on a single icon, rather than using (as one poster mentions, the Taj Mahal for India and a pagoda for Japan). Perhaps you could pick several major features in different countries--e.g., Mt. Kilimanjaro, Victoria Falls, the Pyramids, the Serengeti and its wildlife.  Distances could be within countries or between them and thereby would be informative--e.g., the distance from Dijbouti in the east to Dakar, Senegal, in the west--the widest point of the continent, or the longest point (as you currently do, but name the countries?).  Lighthearted is good, as is informative and appreciate your determination to avoid stereotyping (unintentional as it was, I'm sure) and offensive content.  Again, thanks for your attention to this!  

[BLBJ]

I just got this rather offensive badge about African been a jungle and not going “banana”. The undertone is ludicrous. There are more than 1001 ways to present the badge but fitbit chose the stereotypical message. I will keeping sharing the badge on social medial to get more input till this is fully resolved.

---

@CarlosCFitbit wrote:

Everyone -- Thanks for all the feedback. We've decided to make a change. Our Product team will be updating the badge with a new design and congratulatory messaging. We are currently assessing design ideas and don't know what the badge will look like at this time. 

In order to ensure the best possible experience for our customers, we need to test any changes. For this reason, I can't give you an exact timeframe for when the new badge will be implemented, but rest assured this change will go into effect soon. We appreciate your patience.

More to come!

---

[J-flex]

Now does this mean that all hard earned badges are going to been changed to new designs & logos?  What if I don’t want any of mine to be changed?  Do I have an option?

[WendyB]

You Might want to look at the date of the posts. All pretty old. And over reacting because of old posts

[LZeeW]

@BLBJ  The Fitbit team redesigned the image of the badge in July.  With your comment, I see that they didn't change the text that goes with it.

@CarlosCFitbit  The new congratulatory message is just as offensive as the old one.  Please go back to square one.

[J-flex]

---

@WendyB wrote:

You Might want to look at the date of the posts. All pretty old. And over reacting because of old posts

---

Actually I was responding to the most recent post.  Just want clarification, surely you can’t object to that. smh....

[BLBJ]

I actually just got the new badge with the updated image but text is still the same. I am not referring old message but a new incidence.

[AmyMaynard]

I miss the Africa badge. Maybe they could just say we should ROAR because there is a picture of a lion! Elsa would miss her pride and her badge. Lol. I appreciate your not liking the gorillas and the stereotype about jungle. Hey why not a waterfall picture? Or pyramids or diamonds. I agree with you but miss the badge. Lots of the commentary is offensive in the challenges too like leaving folks in the dust etc but mostly we are too busy to read that junk. It could hurt us. Hope this helps!

[Angelhakuna]

Good grief, one of the woke offended people has now called Fitbit offensive because of words meant to portray a long walk through a beautiful piece of nature. Please stop with adjusting to fit thier singularity, I find it quite offensive how companies are willing to adjust to this woke bs rather than actually standing up to this underlying crude form of bully