Coca-Cola’s “It’s Beautiful” Super Bowl Ad Brings Out Some Ugly Americans
POSTED BY: Niki2
UPDATED: Tuesday, July 23, 2024 19:28
VIEWED: 9389
PAGE 1 of 7
Quote:
Coca Cola’s entry into the Super Bowl ad campaign had a message that was, as it were, Coke Classic: it celebrated the many kinds, colors, lifestyles and origins of Americans who are nonetheless one. Over a scene of these many Americans, it played a patriotic song: not the National Anthem, but the more accessible, singable “America the Beautiful.” It showed us a panoply of American faces, young, old, brown, white, straight, gay (it included what are said to be the first gay parents depicted in a Super Bowl ad), in cowboy hats and hijabs, playing, eating, and exploring all-American vistas.
It was maybe a little sappy, but it was also, well, beautiful, as was the music, sung in a succession of single voices and languages.
It was that last aspect that unfortunately, brought out America the Ugly, at least on some parts of the Internet. “WTF?” asked one post on Twitter. “@CocaCola has America the Beautiful being sung in different languages in a #SuperBowl commercial? We speak ENGLISH here, IDIOTS.” Some of the vitriol may have been satire for all I know, but there was much too much for that to explain all of the “English or GTFO” sentiment–not all of it in impeccable English itself. To wit: “Dear @CocaCola : America the beautiful is sang in English. Piss off. #DontFuckWithUs.”
The xenophobic protesters had one thing right: we do speak English in America. We speak it on official business and in Super Bowl broadcasts; we use it in publications like this one.
But that’s not all we do. People like my immigrant mother and her immigrant sisters learn English as adults and raise their kids to speak it, and also speak French and Arabic at family get-togethers and on phone calls. We speak English in school and Spanish with grandparents and Spanglish with friends. We speak Creole and Chinese and Tagalog sitting down to family dinners–maybe with a bottle or two of Coke around the table, which is why Coke is smart to recognize this.
We come to America, in other words, and we become American–but we don’t erase everything else that we were before, we don’t forget our cultures and languages as if they never existed, and we don’t hide them as if they’re shameful or less than patriotic. We bring them out and share them, and they make this country better and stronger. America isn’t weakened because people don’t submit to a monoculture; it’s strong because it can absorb the peoples and aspirations and talents of the rest of the world without erasing their cultures.
Which is the message this ad shared (besides “Buy Coke”)–it was not a rejection of English, but a celebration of it, and series of tongues, representing all corners of the Earth, resolving in a final line sung in the country’s lingua franca of English and the tag: “America Is Beautiful.”
And it is, even if some people can listen to that chorus and hear nothing but noise. http://entertainment.time.com/2014/02/02/coca-colas-its-beautiful-supe
r-bowl-ad-brings-out-some-ugly-americans/#ixzz2sGmdjyKo
Allan West: Quote:
If we cannot be proud enough as a country to sing “American the Beautiful” in English in a commercial during the Super Bowl, by a company as American as they come — doggone we are on the road to perdition. This was a truly disturbing commercial for me. http://allenbwest.com/2014/02/coca-cola-ad-super-bowl-americans-brand-
hm/
Breitbart:Quote:
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
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I remember thinking during the commercial "wow, I bet the tea party fringe is gonna go nuts over this"
and, on cue...
It really was a very nicely done piece, but of course how dare one of the largest multinational corporations in the world celebrate diversity "OH THE HORROR!"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I knew they'd show their bigotry right away. Read the comments on the Breitbart article for some real facepalm-worthy idiocy.
These people vote!
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by reaverfan:
I knew they'd show their bigotry right away. Read the comments on the Breitbart article for some real facepalm-worthy idiocy.
These people vote!
They're also extremely entertaining in a gruesome way, like when a guy is juggling chainsaws on a unicycle, and then suddenly has to dodge a flamethrower.
Seriously, I am in desperate need of some popcorn over here, the comments sections on this are mayhem wherever you look.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
It's nice sentiment, but a nation that can't understand each other isn't going to last for very long.
If all these peoples are here because they truly love the idea of what America is, and for freedom, meh, that's fine. But to be honest, I don't think many immigrants, or at least a large portion of them, don't come here to BE Americans.
Fathom the hypocrisy of a government that requires every citizen to prove they are insured... but not everyone must prove they are a citizen
I'm just a red pill guy in a room full of blue pill addicts.
" AU, that was great, LOL!! " - Chrisisall
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Yeah, it's pretty sad. I have a suspicion that if this had been televised back when I was young, say the '60s or so, there wouldn't have been nearly as many people going off the deep end.
And what's sadly amusing is that they want everyone else to learn English, when so many of THEM can't spell or write or speak it properly, and a goodly number of them even called it the "National Anthem"! Ignorant schmucks displaying their ignorant schmuckiness, and by gawd, damned proud of it!
If you travel the world, people speak many different languages in every country on earth, but not only do too many Americans want everyone speaking English only in America, they'd be DAMNED if they'd learn some "foreign language", even to travel to other countries. Very sad, what we've come to.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
It's nice sentiment, but a nation that can't understand each other isn't going to last for very long.
Fact: The last century was the first time that any of the major powers had over a 90% literacy rate.
Talking and understanding is overrated, as we have daily proof.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
I don't drink their product much-- I prefer the stuff in the blue can-- but I'm going out of my to drink one today.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME