BTW: Katherine Lee Bates was a lesbian.
Joe.My.God
Michael Patrick Leahy, Breitbart:
"Executives at Coca Cola thought it was a good idea to run a 60 second Super Bowl ad featuring children singing America The Beautiful – a deeply Christian patriotic anthem whose theme is unity – in several foreign languages. The ad also prominently features a gay couple. Conservatives instantly lit up social media with objections, with many vowing to boycott the soda company's products. The lyrics of the song, written in 1893 by Wellesley College Professor Katherine Lee Bates, ask God to grant America 'brotherhood / From sea to shining sea.' As far as the executives at Coca Cola are concerned, however, the United States of America is no longer a nation ruled by the Constitution and American traditions in which English is the language of government. It is not a nation governed in the Anglo-American tradition of liberty. It is instead a nation governed by some all inclusive multi-cultural synthesis of the various forms of government in the world, as expressed by the multiple languages used in the Super Bowl ad to sing a uniquely American hymn that celebrates our heritage." (emphasis mine)
Yes, the tweets of outrage came fast and furious:
- #BoycottCoke everything in that @CocaCola commercial was un-American.
- Too bad there were no Americans in the coke commercial about America.. Goodbye Diet Coke never again! #BoycottCoke
- Coca Cola is the official soft drink of illegals crossing the border. #americaisbeautiful
- @CocaCola American Patriotic songs should be sung in English only #communist #boycottcoke
Tweets of outrage at Coca Cola for airing a commercial featuring the diversity of America while singing America The Beautiful have actually spawned a "Boycott Coke" movement. Total assimilation, it seems, MUST be honored, especially during that most American of events, the Super Bowl. The "English-only" crowd screamed "BLASPHEMY!"* The commercial could have have been more reprehensible had it featured (gasp!) different religions. David Barton would have been furious, but he would have been appeased by the Budwieser commercial which did not have one truly "un-American" person in it.
Budweiser, of course, played it safe with Right-wingers and "true" patriots by featuring a totally white homecoming of a soldier. Nothing wrong with that. But Budweiser has never been true to its original roots: Budwies (aka Budvar in Czech) originated in České Budějovice, in the lower part of Bohemia (now Czech Republic). It distanced itself with Milwaukee and Clydesdales (from Scotland, btw) and never looked back after being eclipsed by Pilsner Urquell of the original Pilsner beers.
Assimilation: it's how you look at it.
The only foreigners not forced to assimilate when they came to America were the Puritans who were all too eager to assimilate Native Americans into their culture.** After the Puritans, a certain form of "Americanism" was born - and everyone was forced to assimilate into America and it's Puritan ethic. Money and prestige followed. People who assimilated slowly (or not at all), collected in remote sections of the country, but the expansion (Manifest Destiny) demanded that assimilation be the virtual law of the land.
What "Truly American" Right wingers don't understand about assimilation is that it comes in different degrees and forms: first, second and even third generation Americans are loathe to give up their roots altogether: the concept of America as a "melting pot" is rather terrifying, melting away, watering down actually, everything about your old culture to homogenize yourself with everyone and form a mass of people, molded by the dictates of one particular group that just so happens to be there slightly longer. So many Americans have opted to keep part of their lengthier heritage while blending into the "mainstream" with things like ... Coke.
Face it, Right-wingers, America is as diverse as your own ancestry: English, French, Dutch, German, Italian, Filipino, Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, and on ... and on ... and on.
The world embraced Coke. Coke Embraced the world. The world embraced America. America embraced the world. Get over it.
*Of course, the Tea Party crowd spells it "BLASFAMIE"
**The first Bible to be translated was translated by the Puritans into the language of the Massachusetts tribe - just before the good Puritans wiped them out.
You haven't been to many blogs have you? Attack blogs like Ann Coulter's and Michele Malkin's are a helluvalot worse. I really can't say I "hate" anyone with a different opinion (and I certainly don't hate you for having one), but I "hate" the hypocrisy engendered by righteous arrogance. The above situation is a prime example: if America is defined by mindless, flag-waving people who know little about other cultures (and even their own America), then maybe it's time we changed the definition.
ReplyDeleteThe issue was that Coca Cola took a much-loved song about America and showed it's diversity by having the song sung in different languages as well as English. Some people considered it highly offensive simply because they consider diversity to be offensive. They chimed in before they thought about their own origins and the difficulties of assimilation. That was stupid. It was hypocritical.
And no, I will not shut the fuck up. Sorry if the post offended you.