“The Look,” like the coded gaze, is a reflection of societal cues of who was deemed suspicious, who was assumed to have authority, and whom our children were taught to shun. The ad follows a day in the life of a Black man who is facing everyday yet no less painful discrimination as he is followed in a department store as if he could be a thief and distanced by workplace colleagues as an unwelcome presence. The final scene reveals he is in fact a judge, but even that standing in society when he leaves the bench of authority is no shield for microaggressions.
