Avril Lavigne's new music video "Hello Kitty," co-written with and directed by her husband from Nickelback Chad Kroeger, is getting all sorts of negative attention in the West and is apparently even being pulled down, "disappearing from the internet" at a rapid rate says metalsucks.net. In a sentence, the video is an explosion of Japanese pop culture, Japanese girls trying to pop and lock in the background, and less than genius lyrics (fun though, right?). Exhibit A;

“Let’s play truth or dare/ We can roll around in our underwear/ How every silly kitty should play”

Minna saikou translates roughly to “you’re all great.” Minna (written みんな) means “everyone” and saikou (最高 or さいこう) means “the best.” Arigato (ありがと) means “thank you.” Ka-Ka-Ka-Kawaiii! means "cu-cu-cu-cute"

We grew up with Gwen Stefanie's harajuku girls, and we loved them, and now Avril Lavigne has a pack of Asian chicks; maybe she hit the same idea room in the really long intro to Gwen's "What You Waiting For." The question on every university kid's mind (especially from the 90s) is "is this racist?" If you read our interview with Canadian R&B group Lucas Teague you'd know that Japanese fans are open to new sound, will get behind something if they like it even if it's not popular, and are extremely loyal - and apparently you can strike serious music deals where they live, in the land of the rising sun. For me, I just imagine Japanese kids at one of her concert's watching the gaijin "foreigner" / gweilo "white devil" (oh wait, that's Chinese) sing Japanese words with conviction; racist isn't exactly the first thing that comes to mind. But I don't have a master's degree.

Would it have been better if there were 4 white girls in the background (e.g. spice girls)? How about an Asian Avril and 4 white girls behind? What does Gwen think about this?

Indulge your inner intellectual with this 100% real Facebook conversation from some bright people I know.