Today's award goes to Kentucky Fried Chicken's German operation. The BBC reports:
KFC has apologised after sending a promotional message to customers in Germany, urging them to commemorate Kristallnacht with cheesy chicken.
The Nazi-led series of attacks in the country in 1938 left more than 90 people dead, and destroyed Jewish-owned businesses and places of worship.
It is widely seen as the beginning of the Holocaust.
The message, heavily criticised for its insensitivity, was later blamed on "an error in our system".
There's more at the link.
Wikipedia notes:
"The Times of London observed on 11 November 1938: 'No foreign propagandist bent upon blackening Germany before the world could outdo the tale of burnings and beatings, of blackguardly assaults on defenceless and innocent people, which disgraced that country yesterday.' "
Just how dunderheaded, purblind and asinine were those designers of the app that KFC allegedly used to highlight the date to its customers? Is it even possible that they could be blind to such an error? I'm tempted to say that it can't be out of neglect. I don't see how it could not have been deliberate.
Ye Gods and little fishes . . .
Peter
What's that old saying?
ReplyDeleteThose who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
I highly suspect that the idiots who screwed this up so horribly badly simply had not the slightest clue what Kristallnacht actually was other than a cool name no one really remembered.
A strong indication that the Germans teach history about as well as the Americans do.
+1
DeleteI suspect that "error in our system" has been fired.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDelete"... could outdo the tale of burnings and beatings, of blackguardly assaults on defenceless and innocent people, which disgraced that country yesterday.'
I have to admit I first thought about places like Portland or Kenosha or most places Antifa have showed up at.
Lots of anti-Semite recent immigrants in Germany, KFC could have been catering to them.
ReplyDelete:D
Design and coding outsourced to somewhere that has no idea of Western culture. The program just saw it as a holiday and send out a general ad.
ReplyDeleteOTOH, a KFC ad like "Come get a chicken leg on Juneteenth" would likely produce a different response.
Proof, if you needed it, that Germany cannot be punished enough for starting two world wars. The lesson still hasn't penetrated deeply enough.
ReplyDeleteI knew guys who served in the Pacific during WWII who felt the same way about the Japanese, to their dying day.
@Aesop. Reminds me of the quote attributed to Halsey, "When this war is over, the Japanese language will be spoken only in Hell"
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