Does Olive Garden Need Boycotting?

Yesterday, the Politico reported that someone working for the Olive Garden restaurant chain had stated that the chain would pull all of its TV ads from the David Letterman show, simply because the late-night comic had made an arguably off-color joke about Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol (the one who ended up pregnant, despite her mother's public lectures about "family values" and "abstinence only" birth control).

Later, a different person working for Olive Garden said that the chain had simply finished its ad schedule.

Frankly, I don't understand why anyone would be in arms over an off-color joke about a gal who (possibly at her mother's urging) has galloped into the public arena -- albeit most ironically, or laughably, some might say -- to sell the wildly effective "abstinence only" method of birth control to fellow teenagers.

If Ms. Palin and her mother can't handle being the butt of a joke, then they should high tail it out of the very spotlight they seem to crave. 

Why a national restaurant chain would even consider getting itself tangled up in the Palins' personal mess is beyond me.  Somehow, I doubt that a majority of the chain's customers have taken personal offense over an unkind joke told by a late-night comic about a public figure.

Olive Garden should consider whether some of its customers may take offense at the chain's apparent attempt to shield a public figure from the natural consequences of chasing the spotlight.

Maybe a boycott is in order.

Comments

[flowerplough]

Maybe a boycott is in order. Please. The local Olive Garden is overcrowded, and I would appreciate y'all staying away. Live up to some of your liberal-guilt/green principles, wouldja, and walk or bike miles and miles to the nearly-nearby Farmer's Market and the health food stores so that you can pay double, triple, or more for undersized, spotty produce labelled "Locally Grown", "Organic", or "Fair Trade". Then eat your purchases raw; don't consume energy cooking food just to make it taste a little better. And what's a liberal doing in a chain restaurant, anyway, ever? The carbon footprint! The wasted food! The exploited South American children! The horror!

[damozel]

As Bill Maher said, flower, I am just not sure how to boycott a restaurant where I'd never eat in any case.

[chicken recipes]

Great article, i agree that it's a bit too much to pull the ads off the air. It's good food for though to wonder if a business should have a social position, regardless of the public opinion.

[garden equipment]

For me, it somehow need boycotting.

Luigi Hanway

[felicity]

try workig at olive garden. you will hate them in no time.

[viagra online]

This learning could be from the course, from their roommates, from life, from where ever. They wrote their comment on an index card, anonymously.