It is the point. It’s the point every time this gets brought up. If the only thing that brought you joy as a child was a multibillion dollar hamburger franchise that made its profits on the back of childhood obesity, then you should be glad it is going downhill.
Seriously, “oh nos! McFatty’s doesn’t look like a kid vomited up a box of crayons anymore!! What is the world coming to???” isn’t a compelling argument to anyone who has realized that there is more to life than shitty cheeseburgers. I don’t care that McDonalds changed its color palette to gray because I do not care about McDonalds, other than hoping their entire business model collapses.
Are things worse now today than they were before? In some ways, yes! Show me an example of that! Show me a beautiful river full of trash now, or a local coffee shop that went under, or literally anything other than McDonalds.
Sure, if you narrow your view to literally only what is in front of you. But everyrhing has gotten cheaper, duller, less colorful, and just clearly designed for nothing but extracting capital.
Yes, you’re right, we shouldn’t be advertising that crap to children. But I would like to buy a car with an actual color painted on it, or have a house with actual character, or pay for services that actually work because at least someone behind the scenes actually cares. I feel like we’ve just lost all soul in society and it shows up in all sorts of places you wouldnt expect.
Places like how were all more lonely than anytime in history even though there’s more people than ever, or how people are so scared all the time even though we live in the safest time in the last 150 years, or how people seem to just be angry and have less patience in public any more.
McDonald’s is just an easy target because of how shocking their change has been, and how ubiquitous these changes have been.
These are all reasonable points to make with literally any example other than McDonalds. Saying everything is worse and ruined by capitalism because no one cares about anything except profit anymore is not the trajectory that McDonalds took.
McDonalds in the 1990s was just as cold hearted, capitalist, and profit-seeking as it is today. Its target demo was children who would cry until they got a happy meal, and their weak-willed parents. Thus, it used bright colors, clowns, and ball pits to entice its demo into bringing their money in. McDonalds didn’t suddenly become more greedy and capitalist. They were already maximally greedy and capitalist. What happened is that the government told them they couldn’t advertise to kids anymore. So McDonalds, being greedy and capitalist, pivoted to appealing to adults. They got rid of the play places and ball pits, which were expensive and labor intensive to maintain and which were constantly covered in children’s saliva, puke, and shit. They toned down the color scheme to be less assaulting on the eyes and more relaxing. They improved the quality of their food, and they replaced benches made of cheap hard plastic for padded seats made with some kind of fabric. In many ways, the McDonalds of today are superior to the McDonalds of 20 years ago - it’s a place you’d be comfortable grabbing a quick lunch with some coworkers without feeling like you suddenly stepped into an overstimulating children’s movie.
I honestly like the new look. It says “We’re McDonalds. We sell cheap hamburgers so you can eat and leave quickly, because you aren’t rich enough to have free time. We know it, you know it, we’re all adults here so we don’t have to pretend. Come grab a cheeseburger and get on with your life.”
I’m ok with not marketing addictive junk food to children
Kinda missing the bigger picture
You sound like James monsees ignoring FDA about adding flavours to nicotine and using that as a selling target to younger generations.
Yes, however, that wasn’t the point.
It is the point. It’s the point every time this gets brought up. If the only thing that brought you joy as a child was a multibillion dollar hamburger franchise that made its profits on the back of childhood obesity, then you should be glad it is going downhill.
Seriously, “oh nos! McFatty’s doesn’t look like a kid vomited up a box of crayons anymore!! What is the world coming to???” isn’t a compelling argument to anyone who has realized that there is more to life than shitty cheeseburgers. I don’t care that McDonalds changed its color palette to gray because I do not care about McDonalds, other than hoping their entire business model collapses.
Are things worse now today than they were before? In some ways, yes! Show me an example of that! Show me a beautiful river full of trash now, or a local coffee shop that went under, or literally anything other than McDonalds.
Sure, if you narrow your view to literally only what is in front of you. But everyrhing has gotten cheaper, duller, less colorful, and just clearly designed for nothing but extracting capital.
Yes, you’re right, we shouldn’t be advertising that crap to children. But I would like to buy a car with an actual color painted on it, or have a house with actual character, or pay for services that actually work because at least someone behind the scenes actually cares. I feel like we’ve just lost all soul in society and it shows up in all sorts of places you wouldnt expect.
Places like how were all more lonely than anytime in history even though there’s more people than ever, or how people are so scared all the time even though we live in the safest time in the last 150 years, or how people seem to just be angry and have less patience in public any more.
McDonald’s is just an easy target because of how shocking their change has been, and how ubiquitous these changes have been.
These are all reasonable points to make with literally any example other than McDonalds. Saying everything is worse and ruined by capitalism because no one cares about anything except profit anymore is not the trajectory that McDonalds took.
McDonalds in the 1990s was just as cold hearted, capitalist, and profit-seeking as it is today. Its target demo was children who would cry until they got a happy meal, and their weak-willed parents. Thus, it used bright colors, clowns, and ball pits to entice its demo into bringing their money in. McDonalds didn’t suddenly become more greedy and capitalist. They were already maximally greedy and capitalist. What happened is that the government told them they couldn’t advertise to kids anymore. So McDonalds, being greedy and capitalist, pivoted to appealing to adults. They got rid of the play places and ball pits, which were expensive and labor intensive to maintain and which were constantly covered in children’s saliva, puke, and shit. They toned down the color scheme to be less assaulting on the eyes and more relaxing. They improved the quality of their food, and they replaced benches made of cheap hard plastic for padded seats made with some kind of fabric. In many ways, the McDonalds of today are superior to the McDonalds of 20 years ago - it’s a place you’d be comfortable grabbing a quick lunch with some coworkers without feeling like you suddenly stepped into an overstimulating children’s movie.
I honestly like the new look. It says “We’re McDonalds. We sell cheap hamburgers so you can eat and leave quickly, because you aren’t rich enough to have free time. We know it, you know it, we’re all adults here so we don’t have to pretend. Come grab a cheeseburger and get on with your life.”