The real question people should be asking isn't "Why is Quaker Oats retiring the Aunt Jemima brand now?" but rather "Why didn't Quaker Oats retire the Aunt Jemima brand decades ago?"
For anyone who isn't familiar with the backstory, "Old Aunt Jemima" was a song that was sung at racist minstrel shows in the late 19th century. The Aunt Jemima character was performed by a male actor dressed in drag and wearing blackface. The lyrics included the line "The monkey dressed in soldier clothes, Old Aunt Jemima, oh! oh! oh!" The word monkey in that lyric is not referring to a simian. Yeah.
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