Recently, I came across the story of Lauren McClucky, a big-hearted 19-year-old who lives in the Chicago area and has been using "McFest" as the name for her charitable concerts that raise $30,000 for Special Olympics® in 2007 and 2008. It was only when she decided to trademark the effort in 2009 that the Oak Brook, Ill.-based restaurant chain "lawyered up" against her. As a result, she's had to spend some $5,000 -- about half of the proceeds from the 2009 concert -- on legal fees.
"It has nothing to do with food, arches or their colors," she told one publication recently, and "our M's are pointy, not curved."
The plight of this do-good girl might not have been deemed blogworthy had it not been for some of the restaurant's other efforts which had recently shown up on my "radar" and found a place on what I call my "watch list" of future story topics.
A couple of weeks ago, I came across the restaurant chain's effort to cater to the African-American community via its 365Black® campaign which touts the message, "we believe that African-American culture and achievement should be celebrated 365 days a year — not just during Black History Month." In response, I say, what other cultures and achievements are you celebrating?
Today, I learned that the 31,000-restaurant chain had ticked off its Chinese customers while trying to not offend Muslims and ended up apologizing to them. Below is how it was explained in an article in Singapore's Straits Times newspaper:
McDonald's this month started selling cartoon character miniatures depicting the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac calendar, but the pig was replaced by love god Cupid as McDonald's said it did not want to offend Muslims.
Can you see why I'm a little peeved? If Miss McClusky was a black Muslim from China, I seriously doubt that the restaurant chain would have released its hounds (a.k.a., "lawyers") to attack her and her charity over a petty trademark issue. Not in today's politically-correct environment!
