Thursday, July 31, 2014

You're OK

Mollie Hemingway writes:
IN May, Burger King announced it was dropping its 40-year-old “Have It Your Way” slogan. The new tag line for the fast-food company is “Be Your Way.”


What does “being your way” have to do with burgers and fries? The company said in a statement that the new motto is intended to remind people that “they can and should live how they want anytime,” that “it’s OK to not be perfect,” and that “self-expression is most important.”

Oh for crying out loud. Still, it’s fascinating that an advertising firm was able to sell corporate giants on the idea that encouraging mediocrity, stagnation, and unbridled narcissism in consumers would somehow make mass-produced burgers more appetizing. ....

There’s no question that much of American society has embraced the idea that people “can and should live how they want anytime.” But what a departure that is from traditional Jewish and Christian values. Those systems of belief begin with the premise that man is not basically good, that man’s nature is in fact deeply problematic and that working to become virtuous is more important than self-expression, if you can imagine it. ....

A culture that tells whoppers in order to sell Whoppers isn’t a healthy one.
"Hold the Self-Regard," National Review, August 11, 2014, p. 52.

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