Month: November 2018

Some Guy vs McDonald’s

mcdonald

As I wrote on Tuesday, our world is going crazy.  And the sad thing is we’re not even “slouching towards Bethlehem” in a dignified, poetic journey to the apocalypse.  No, not us!  We’re twittering around Wonderland in a Johnny Depp-esque rendition of the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party – utterly convinced we’re on the road to salvation.  Let me give you yet another example.

Some guy in Quebec, Canada is suing McDonald’s because, he alleges, they are breaking Quebec law by advertising their Happy Meals™ directly at children.  Whoa!  I’m no expert on marketing, but I’m fairly certain that when a restaurant gives away toys with its food and has a clown as its spokesperson, children are involved somewhere.  Anyway, Monsieur Bramante, a father of three kids under 13, came to the same conclusion and decided somebody should do something about this – and that he was just the boy.  He hired a lawyer (on spec, probably) and launched a Class Action Suit.  M. Bramante maintains that he, his family and anybody else who’s ever bought a Happy Meal™ are being victimized by McDonald’s flagrant flaunting of the law.  According to court documents, he says he “eats at McDonald’s about once every two weeks on the urging of his children.”  Plus, he estimates that he has spent hundreds of dollars on Happy Meals™ over the years.

So, what’s wrong with this picture?  Sounds pretty typical, for the 21st century — find some corporate Goliath and go David on their ass for media attention, fun and, perhaps, profit.  Unfortunately, there are a couple of flies in the ointment.

First of all, suing somebody just because they suggest you buy their product is ludicrous.  Unlike death and taxes, McDonald’s is not inevitable.  You don’t have to go there.  Like drugs, you can tell your kids to “Just say no!”

Secondly, you’re the dad!  No matter how much they “urge” you, taking nutritional directions from your kids is not a good idea.  There’s a reason we don’t allow children to vote, drive or operate heavy machinery.  Duh!  Counting on them to decide what (and where) the family eats is exactly ass-backwards.

Finally, and here’s the WTF moment: YOU’RE THE DAD!  Your kids may very well have motivation to go to McDonald’s but if they end up there, you’re the one providing them with the means and opportunity.  What’s wrong with you?  Downloading the responsibility onto Ronald McDonald doesn’t cut it.  Honestly, you need to spend a little less time dicking around in the legal system and a lot more time being the parent.

No wonder half the people on this planet want to blow us up!

PETA vs Wool

wool

If you haven’t noticed, our society is going nuts.  We seem to spend our days wandering around Wonderland, looking for the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party — and last week we got a couple of steps closer.

PETA, a band of uber-bored rich people who think the rest of us spend our leisure hours kicking puppies and slaughtering chickens, has ventured out onto the last looney branch of the crazy tree.  They’ve decided that a village in Dorset, UK is promoting cruelty to animals because – and here’s the good part – its name is Wool.  Whoa!  That’s a bit much!  It’s kinda like saying St Louis, San Francisco and St Moritz are raising awareness for the Catholic Church.

Anyway, PETA wasn’t done.  They wrote to the parish council and promised 2,000 “cruelty free” blankets if the good people of Wool would kindly change the name of their village to Vegan Wool.  Publicity stunt?  Maybe.  Unfortunately, I have this nagging idea that the people at PETA actually believe the local bumpkins are spinning their wool into garments to keep warm.  Not only that, but I’m pretty sure PETA also thinks that by generously providing the peasants with a reasonable alternative, they’ll put an end to this cycle of agrarian abuse.  Woke is woke — right?  Either way, there hasn’t been this much condescension hanging in the air since Peter Minuit offered the locals a big bag of beads for Manhattan.

The problem is PETA, being PETA, failed to do its homework – again.  The truth is the village name Wool doesn’t have anything to do with wool — or sheep — or any other kind of animal husbandry.  The name is derived from the Old Saxon word “Welle” which means “flowing water.”  The original village took its name from that – a local stream.  Over the last 10 centuries (since the Saxons held sway in England) the inflection has been corrupted.  Thus Welle became Wool.  Oops!  It turns out the only thing the citizens of Wool are guilty of is mispronunciation.

Personally, I think it’s one thing for a multinational, multimillion-dollar organization like PETA to bully a pastoral little village, but I’d like to see them try this crap on a tough town like Buffalo, New York or HAMburg, Germany.  Then we’d see how far their 2,000 blankets gets them!

 

Image: Peter Trimming

Black Friday 2018

black friday

Unless you live on Jupiter, you know that today in America (and increasingly around the world) it’s Black Friday.  This is an annual orgasm of consumer culture that has psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists and bloggers like me bursting at the seams with explanations of why ordinary people go nuts every 4th Friday in November.  The truth is people can’t help it.  We have culture, history and our own DNA working against us.

First of all, humans are essentially hunter/gatherers.  No matter how far out of the caves we think we’ve come, just go to somebody’s house and take a look around.  What you see is a lifetime of hunting for and gathering up loads of stuff that, for the most part, we don’t need.  The fact is, many of us have gathered up so much crap that we have to pack some of it in boxes and hide it in the basement.  Yeah, yeah, yeah: we all want to eat, sleep and watch TV out of the rain, but one of the main reasons we even have houses (the bigger, the better) is to store our stuff.  And we put locks on the doors just in case another hunter/gatherer wanders by and decides to add to his collection by stealing from ours.  Black Friday is just an elaborate hunting expedition where the weapons of choice are credit cards — not spears.

Second, humans are social animals.  We run in herds, and anyone who’s studied herd behaviour will tell you that, once the herd starts moving, it’s pretty hard to stop.  And … the difference between a meandering flock and a ferocious stampede is just a couple of boys in the back thinking they’re going to get left out.  Push comes to shove, and suddenly, Morgan, from your yoga class, is elbowing old ladies out of the way to get at the 60-inch TVs.  Black Friday is just the kind of limited time offer that triggers this herd mentality.

And finally, all human society is built on the bargain.  It’s in our DNA somewhere.  Even the most primitive, egalitarian, every-hand-in-the-pot people are looking for a deal.  Nobody, anywhere, has ever said, “Eddie Bonenose wanted two chickens for his daughter, but I talked him into taking three.”  Never happens!  And retailers know this, so discounts (real or imagined) are everywhere — sales, coupons, 2-for-1, Happy Hour – the only things that never go on sale, these days, are the Church and Apple Computers — and they’re both banking on religion to suck us in.  Anyway, Black Friday is the ultimate something-for-nothing day that satisfies this primitive urge.  No wonder people love it!

Personally, I think Black Friday, like New Year’s Eve, is basically amateur hour, so I don’t participate, but for those who do – I’m pretty sure you’re just fulfilling your cultural, historical and genetic imperative.  Good on ya!