Best STFU Candidate

I had this post all lined up this morning, but then I was perusing the blogs of friends of mine, and I may have found another equally good contender on Travel Vixen's blog about her doctor's appointment experience yesterday.

I'll leave her to share those details, since she is far more eloquent than I, but let me share my original candidate.

The Young Turks is a show that I sometimes watch/listen too. I like their arguments and there approach to various topics.

One of the folks over there however recently had some comments about a KFC ad in Australia, which it considered to be racist. I'm not exactly sure, but I think the advertisement may have been yanked as a result.

The ad basically features a white guy in an Aussie Cricket shirt, at a cricket game, and surrounded by West Indies fans. The West Indies fans are hooting and hollering, beating drums and all of that. The white guy is looking a little stressed and then all of a sudden, he busts out a bucket of KFC chicken and offers to share it. Peace is restored, and where once fans of 2 rival teams sat, now there are friends sharing chicken.

I thought it both an entertaining and a well thought out ad.

Apparently it's racist though... If you click here, you can view the ad, as well as here a follow-up exchange between an Australian radio host, and the opinionated lass from The Young Turks, who claimed it was racist.

I think those comments were unfortunately the result of typical American thinking, where the American point of view is imposed upon those of another land, without consideration of their culture or societal values. This is a rather minor example of that, and I think you could probably consider the ill conceived war in Iraq as the extreme example.

My commments with regards to the interview...

• This was not an American ad and it was intended to be viewed by an American audience.



• KFC is an American company, but having Americans control brand management in a foreign country is a rather stupid idea, at least in my opinion and probably why I suspect the idea for this originated amongst those in Australia who handle this kind of thing over there



• Having actually been to a cricket game, fans jumping around and screaming is actually kind of expected. Perhaps I should take offense as a white male that I am being portrayed as some uptight douche bag with something stuck up my butt.



• Fried Chicken references?!?! HELLO - I've lived in the US for over a decade, and I'm not even sure I know what that means.

Due to my upbringing and things which I've experienced, I am EXTREMELY sensitive to racial type stuff, and I'm sorry folks, but this doesn't even come close to anything remotely racist.

So to the obviously well-meaning commentator on The Young Turks... When it comes to US politics, knock yourself out. But when it comes to innocent, and if I might add, rather humorous advertisement in a foreign TV markets... STFU!!

Good Golly Sheila!! Them Ozzies like takin' the piss out of everyone!!

(My apologies to all genuine Australians who might take offense to my sorry attempt at humour with that last line!)