McDonald's: You Got Billions & Billions Served
Published July 14, 2005
What'chu talkin' about, Ronald?
The latest Golden Arches news to shower on you:
- McDiversity: Black Enterprise magazine just honored McDonald's as one of the "Best Companies for Diversity in America." Is that a good thing? Isn't this equivalent to HUD congratulating Sing Sing prison for having the most racially diverse housing unit in the country? Given that the supermajority of McJobs in the fast food industry are unskilled, offer minimum wage pay, have frequent turnover, lack benefits, and are void of vertical mobility, I'd say McDonald's should only be praised when their reliance on employees of color plummets.
- McPhat Farm: In an idea as ill-fated as the McDLT, McDonald's has approached FUBU, Rocawear, Russell Simmons, P. Diddy, and Tommy Hilfiger, among others, to design a new "hip" and "urban" uniform for their employees. Can you imagine a company called "For Us-By Us" designing threads for a company whose motto is "Billions and Billions Served"? I'm not lovin' it. I swear if Chuck D starts repping Mickey D's, I will drown myself in a vat of nugget grease. Hey, McMarketing team: if you had any sense, you would have chosen Wu-Wear. Because when you flip the W upside down ... Bam! It's the golden arches! McWord!
- McAsians: Just in case you thought they were only targeting the black community, let me remind you that McDonald's owns the domain to http://www.i-am-asian.com/. While providing a list of "what holidays Asian and Pacific Islander Americans celebrate," this harebrained site bombards you with images like this:
Here's the implied caption for the above photo: "When I get upset at my Chinese New Year parade lion dance partner, Tang, for getting up in my grill and trying to enter my dragon, I like to wash down my anger with a Filet-O-Fish, the seafood dish of choice for assimilated Asian Americans like myself."On the main page, there is a slide show of various Asian Americans chowing down Happy Meals (what, no chopsticks?). But in a peculiar twist, the last photo in the montage features a dog with an "I am Asian" shirt. Aside from a potential shout-out to the Shitzu or the Pekingese, what is the message there? FYI, McDonald's: We're not dogs, although we prefer to eat them over your foul hot mustard sauce.
Does anybody believe they care about Asian Pacific American heritage? What a Kroc of sh!t.
- Bringing the McBeef: McDonald's just sent $254,773.19 to a Hindu Heritage Endowment fund. But before you conclude that McDonald's makes generous donations to worthy causes, you should know that this payment was part of the court-ordered $10 million settlement after McDonald's was caught cooking their "vegetarian" french fries with beef tallow.
- McRobbery: Finally, last week, a masked man armed with a pistol robbed a South Carolina McDonald's and forced employees into a walk-in freezer before escaping with significant assets. I'm not saying I know who did it, but I'm guessing the suspect looks something like this:
Robble Robble!
Edited: LH
- McDonald's: You Got Billions & Billions Served
- Published: July 14, 2005
- Type: Opinion
- Section: Tastes
- Filed Under: Tastes: Food and Drink, Culture: Humor and Satire, Politics: U.S., Politics: International, Video: Documentary
- Writer: Junichi Semitsu
- Junichi Semitsu's BC Writer page
- Junichi Semitsu's personal site
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Comments on this articleComments
Maybe this is the part of Western Culture that upsets the muslim fundamentalists so much? In that case, I can't blame them.
Junichi: I'm lovin' your post. Wit, fascinating new information, and satire - all in one. Well done!
Cheers,
Ron
McClassic JS, thanks! I thought it was trillions by now
I see absolutely nothing witty OR insightful about this post. You want to hate on McDonalds. OK, but you'll need to come up with something a bit more creative or thoughtful.
McDonald's is really good about racially diverse hiring? Why, that's bad. If they weren't so adamant about hiring minorities, you'd be indignant over that.
So they have a website trying to reach out to the Asian community. What, there are images there of Asians eating Big Macs? BAD!
It's unfortunate that McDonald's has become one of the most successful business in history. It just causes haters to get their Nietzchean resentment up. Damn them.
C'mon, Al, you know you grinned at least once while reading this! I'll bet it was "When I get upset at my Chinese New Year parade lion dance partner, Tang, for getting up in my grill and trying to enter my dragon...".
Or maybe the "Kroc of sh!t"...
Nah, the whole premise was just not funny to me. MCDONALDS IS BAD. Got it. McDonald's bashing is just stale. Maybe one or two lines of this would be amusing in another context.
Al -- I think "McDonald's bashing" derives partially from America's fear of being taken over by a Big Brother corporate state and partially from its pretty blatant ploys to suck in minority dollars.
Wait, you're saying that McDonald's is blatantly conducting marketing outreach to minorities? Those bastards!
If you wanna bash away at the corporate state, I'd suggest a different target, some company which significantly derives its power or market through the agencies of the government. McDonald's does not seem like a good example. Microsoft also would be a poor example.
Better would be the old reliable military industrial complex. Defense contractors can always use a good bashing.
Personally, I'd pick an entertainment conglomerate, as they obviously have the whole frickin' federal government and most of the states in their hip pockets with their lovely cartel laws in copyright and other areas. Time Warner or Disney would be excellent targets of anti-corporate satire.
This post made me crave a double quarter pounder - damn you all to hell!
Dave
Al - This is neither satire nor a rant about whom I consider to be the worst corporation. I just shared a bunch of news items related to McDonald's and attached my commentary. That's all.
Next time, I'll try to rise to your level of insight and creativity. ;)
On the other hand Junichi, you seem to be capable of taking a bit of criticism without freakin'. That puts you ahead of a lot of folks right there.
Is that Asian McD site real? you sure its not a piss take? Well i thought it was at first anyway. Seriously for 5 minutes i thought that site was just a joke..... untill i saw the
"© 2004-2005 McDonald's Corporation and Affiliates. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy"
Son of a whore they are really trying to take over the planet!
Be proud, you're one of the best and a Blogcritics editors' pick. Go to this link here to finds out why.
Thank you.
Man this is the best blog I have read all day. Great Job! I can't stop laughing.
Yeah, I missed this when it was posted, but holy fuckeroo! Funny (tragic) stuff here!
Very well done Junichi, you deserve having this promoted.
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I can't add a single worthwhile thing to this post but I had to tell you: this was funny as hell!