Give me a Break, Today

At first blush, it seems like your typical slice of life advertising:

A mother and daughter are reading together with the mom encouraging the daughter in the traditional sound-it-out way. They are both delighted when the daughter can read it on her own. She is rewarded with a trip to McDonald's and is presented with a Braille menu because, it turns out, she's blind.

For years that McDonald's has had Braille writing on the lids of the drinks. That's cool -- if the counter staff has the wherewithal to push the little buttons down. However, they neglect to mention that no other artifact at McDonald's, besides the special menu you have to ask for, has Braille. A blind person would not be able to distinguish any of the burgers from one another, or the breakfast sandwiches, or anything else for that matter, unless they were manually counting McNuggets.

Don't forget that had the girl paid for the meal in anything but coinage, there is no way should could tell that she paid the right amount or got the right change (a larger problem which belongs to all of us and not just the Arches).

There are two other disturbing features in this ad:

1) We are enforcing the notion of food as a reward (might I add especially insidious food and for girls, for whom food as reward is a lethal paradigm
2) Except for the slowly read words "Happy Meal" and the last few notes of the current jingle, a blind person listening to this commercial would have no clue that it was for McDonald's, or even about blind people. If you think the jingle is enough: listen to the last 8 notes and sing to yourself "have you driven a Ford lately."

I almost want to give them points for trying, for almost appearing that they really do care, but that is a trap because that is plainly the goal of this ad. The press release touts McDonalds as being a hero for being sensitive to the needs of their customers, and clearly states how generous of heart they are for this portrayal. I far and away prefer the Tide commercials where they show people in wheelchairs doing their laundry and having fun, interspersed with other happy launderers that are not wheelchair bound. They leave the onus of gratitude and sensitivvy of perception on the viewer, and do not demand we immediately acknowledge how wonderful they are. It is nothing more than one in an alarmingly long series of ads geared to elicit an emotional response from the audience, but in this case they are using an infirmity and a half-assed solution as the rallying point.

Why not cover the ADA accessibility of their restaurants which are required to meet standards instead of being halfway solutions? Or maybe that would make people take notice of accessibility violations like restroom doors that are too stiff to open, instead of noticing Braille pips on the drink lids.

What ads have done more harm than good?

leslie@smug.com

in the junk drawer: