Where do women belong? Burger King and the British rag The Mail, learn some painful lessons. Is Tucker Carlson next?

 

Umm, before you blow your top, find out what the rest of the ad says

Semi-literacy isn’t limited to knuckle-dragging Trumpsters. It would seem that even some of us progressives can’t read more than five words before our brains turn to mush.

 

A case in point: While trying to support women chefs in their careers, the Burger King Foundation tweeted out a consciousness-raising ad on International Women’s Day. It was headlined, “Women belong in the kitchen.” Those who were competent to read more than the five-word headline without developing a migraine or calling for their smelling salts would have discovered that the copy went on to say, “Fine dining kitchens, food truck kitchens, casual dining kitchens, ghost kitchens, Burger King kitchens. If there’s a professional kitchen, women belong here.”

 

And it then went on to say, “But can you guess who’s heading those kitchens these days? Exactly. Only 24% of chef positions in America are occupied by women. Want to talk head chefs? The number drops to fewer than 7%.”

 

The ad went on to talk about a “commitment from one of the biggest restaurants in the world to help aspiring female chefs” with scholarships, “Because every woman with a passion deserves the choice to advance, whether it’s in culinary school, a Burger King Kitchen, or any other kitchen in the world.”

 

I say hurrah! But some of my fellow progressives, who evidently develop muscle cramps in their lips after struggling through a five-word headline in big type, had such furious meltdowns that Burger King folded, apologized, and declared that the tweet was “wrong.”

 

So I guess there is no place for women chefs after all, eh Burger King?

 

Now the advertising community is getting its knickers in a twist, cautioning against what boils down to the use of clever attention-getting headlines. They may have discovered, alas, that while idiots generally makes more noise on the right, ultimately the entire human race is a race of nincompoops.

 

Freedom to distress. My first four grownup jobs involved reporting for newspapers —a chain of suburban weeklies, a small town daily, a big city daily, and the weeklies again, that last time as their editor — before deciding that I needed to make a living. That led me to a frivolous but much-better-paid life in advertising. However, I’ve always strongly favored unfettered freedom of the press. Leave it to the Brits to sour me on my own cause.

 

I’m talking about the distress inflicted on Meghan Markle — and no, this is not about the Oprah interview. Well before that, the Mail On Sunday (that’s the name of a British tabloid) published a private letter Meghan wrote to her father. And then milked, and milked, and milked the contents of the letter and commentary about it to sell newspapers. 

 

Now the judge in a British High Court (whatever that is) has ordered the Mother Of All Confessions. It’s a statement that The Mail On Sunday infringed Meghan Markle’s copyright on a letter than the court said was, “personal and private”. The statement must appear on the front page. And on page 3, “for a period of one week.” 

 

Wait, there’s more! The online version of the newspaper must also publish the statement for a week, with a link to the court’s “full judgment.”

 

The judge’s ruling in part said:

"The defendant devoted a very considerable amount of space to the infringing articles, which it continued to publish for over two years."

 

"It has devoted a very considerable number of further column inches, and many hundreds if not thousands of words, to coverage of earlier stages of this litigation and commentary upon them.

 

"The wording sought is modest by comparison and factual in nature."

To which I might add, let’s remember what freedom of the press is for. It’s for conveying information and opinions in pursuit of a civil society and good government. It’s not for prying into and often ruining private lives so you can up your circulation and charge more for your advertising.

 

A pregnant thought for Tucker Carlson. Over at No More Mister Nice Blog, Steve M. reports on Tucker Carlson’s Fox-y outrage machine all but bursting into flames about a report concerning the Air Force and pregnant women in its ranks.

 

“Pregnant women are going to fight our wars,” fumes Carlson. “It’s a mockery of the U.S. Military.” And he blames it on Joe Biden. 

 

Of course he does. Even though it’s a lie.

 

No More Mister Nice Blog points out that the “maternity flight suits” that are getting Tucker’s knickers in a twist were all announced under the Trump administration. And “VileWhig,” who commented on the No More Mister post added, “Anyone who thinks flight suits are for dropping into enemy territory doesn’t know the difference between flight crews and paratroopers.”

 

Another comment, from “brucej” noted that the change applied to remotely piloted aircrew, missile operations duty crews,” which are desk jobs.

 

“We’re back into the days of poutrage over tan suits, Dijon mustard and arugla lettuce again, aren’t we,” asks brucej.

 

Ya think? Wait, I’ll ask Mr. Potato Head.