January 03, 2005

Overreaction on Chick-Fil-A ad

Michelle Malkin (who saw a piece on LibertyBlog) seems to be overreacting a little bit to a Chick-Fil-A ad that aired over the weekend during the Peach Bowl telecast.

The ad (which itself is several years old, mind you) has a cow standing down first one, then a line of tanks. LibertyBlog points out a correlation between the ad and the infamous tank standoff at Beijing's Tianenamen Square years ago.

Call me clueless, but I've never seen the correlation 'til it was pointed out today.

I'm certain that Chick-Fil-A management, from founder Truett Cathy on down would have very quickly yanked said ad if the correlation were pointed out to them.

Cathy and the entire hierarchy of CFA are staunch conservatives, and devout Christians (as profiled in the November/December 2004 issue of Christian magazine New Man and elsewhere), and would have definitely not stood for something that would have evoked such negative connotations.

As I mentioned, the ad has run here in the Southeast (and here in their home market of Atlanta) for several years (and I'd presume nationally as well), with no repercussions. And quiet as it's kept, I actually thought that ad had been retired from CFA's regular tv ad run due to it's age. I'm honestly surprised it ran this week.

In any event, I'm sure they didn't mean any sort of harm, and that if contacted directly, would happily apologize for any offense.

(More coverage from Sharp as a Marble and others)

Posted by mhking at January 3, 2005 02:36 PM
Comments

They knew it. So what?

I don't see the harm.

Posted by: DarkStar at January 3, 2005 07:56 PM

FWIW, I'm sure I would have recognized the parallel had I seen it. As to whether it's wrong to use the imagery, I -- having once written a humor piece drawing on Tiananmen Square for one of the jokes, would not be the right person to ask.

Or maybe I would...

Posted by: McGehee at January 4, 2005 03:53 PM

I work at Chik Fil A, and I happen to know they are evil, vile people with no taste or knowlage of such sensitive issues like they covered on the commercial. They are ignorant people who I guess just didnt know any better. I am sad to call myself a Chik Fil A employee, but I am for now.

Posted by: Travis at October 14, 2005 12:15 PM
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