Mumsnet and McDonalds

[tattychicken]

DH popped into a Mcdonalds yesterday to (ahem) use the facilities. Did his usual trick of taking his iPhone with him, and later let me know that when he was connecting to the Internet, the free wifi for McDonalds users popped up 'in conjunction with Mumsnet'!!! The blurb on mumsnet still says they don't allow advertising from mcdonalds, but when we googled it, it turns out this ban was lifted last May, and 'Mumsnet is proud to be associated with the family friendly restaurant'. .

WTF? You might be, MNHQ, but I'm not.

that's fine. i do understand why she would find it an odd fit, because as you say McD's has been blamed as being the big bogey man for so long and this is a parenting site. but i don't personally agree with her, i don't think MN's remit should have to extend to partnering only with wholefoods etc. not least because none of them are squeaky-clean, some restaurants ad spends manage to convince us that their food is of better quality when it may be nothing of the sort. (i appreciate that those MNers who are wholly immune to advertising will not be affected by this. )

but people can be snobbish about lots of things. some people on here are not snobby about food, but are incredibly snobby about the paint they put on their walls, or the clothes they wear. some, many of whom have made themselves plain on this thread, are reverse snobs.

what i don't get is the level of aggression that has been shown. i'm putting it down to the full moon, because the alternative, which is that this place is just a bear pit full of people leaving their brains at the door and taking their prejudices for a walk, is too depressing for words.

I thought these two had some balls taking on this fight for so long

In June 1995, McDonald's offered to settle the case (which "was coming up to its first anniversary in court"[14]) by donating a large sum of money to a charity chosen by the two. They further specified that they would drop the case if Steel and Morris agreed to "stop criticising McDonald's".[14] Steel and Morris secretly recorded the meeting; McDonald's said the pair could criticise McDonald's privately to friends but must cease talking to the media or distributing leaflets. Steel and Morris wrote a letter in response saying they would agree to the terms if McDonald's ceased advertising its products and instead only recommended the restaurant privately to friends.[11]

This was the piece I liked the most

Completely unrelated but today I had the most delicious food that I'd been craving and it was good!! 2 Mayo Chicken Burgers, Large Fries and a carton of Milk. My DH is the best and at 34 weeks pregnant he doesn't question me getting it on his way home from work

YABU. This is MN not an NHS website about healthy eating.

The McLibel Two probably did influence how I feel about McDs. And I suspect it probably influenced McDs in this country, too - in terms of the potential reputational damage and its ethical and nutritional stance.

Steel and Morris won their European court case eventually, although that was against the UK government IIRC re right to a fair trial.

People can say what they like about McDs, the fact is, it remains very popular with a wide range of people.

Erh vessel - no you can't just say what you like about mcd's, that was the point

My mistake!

It's 8.07am in Qatar. Am very hungover, although I think I may have picked up a virus or something because I really do feel so very ill! Thats my story anyway. Guess where I am off to for breakfast...

It is like all things, OK in moderation. If DCs go there occasionally, they work out for themselves that there are much better places to eat. If you never let them go they can't work it out for themselves. There is no point in strict policing of diets because there comes a time when you can't. If you have always eaten a healthy, balanced diet yourself and treated eating as a pleasurable, sociable activity - they will do the same. It immediately becomes desirable when people make such a fuss about it.

Have sent DH to pick up one of these brownies at McD on his way through town! I've never had a full size one from there. But does anyone else remember the McMinis? A little rectangular box with a tiny brownie, mini donut and mini chocolate cornflake thing? YUM. I miss them.

Can anyone explain the 'straw man' thing and how it relates to McD please? I'm not familiar with the term and didn't understand what it said on wiki.

I made DH stop at Maccie D's yesterday, after following this thread I had a desperate craving for a cheeseburger and managed to scoff two in quick succession

Libel is a prosecutable offence - it's against the law. What the McD 2 did was libellous - simple. It wasn't advertising and can't be compared to that. Any company would have done the same. You can't just go ranting on about how evil a company is. You can only make people aware of the issues caused by a company's activities, based on hard facts. They should have watched their words more carefully, or selected a company that was doing serious damage like the pharmaceuticals or oil companies - or even campaigned about the Romanian orphans. If you're going to spend half your life campaigning, do it about something worthwhile and let everyone else go and eat burgers in peace.

The only one of my middle class friends who approved of her daughter eating in McD's was a GP. I don't like this thread because it's making me hungry .

I don't understand this at all. I posted much earlier in the thread that my personal choice was not to eat Macdonalds. This was jumped on a little, like I had made a semi-scathing comments on the personal lives of some people on the thread.

If anyone takes offense by me choosing not to eat Macdonalds, that's your issue. The general tone was lots of people jumping up and down about how much they loved Macdonalds, with more than a little defensive tone about it and implying that those that choose not eat Macdonalds are snobs

Nowhere in my posts did I say anything like anyone is unreasonable for the food choices they make. What I do object to is a general tone directed at me initially that I am looking down on people. I genuinely could not care less what y'all eat. That's entirely up to you. I made that abundantly clear. But don't fucking judge me because of the choices I've made! Mocking posts about choosing to eat in local cafes, supporting local businesses, making fun of healthy eating - it's the biggest load of bullshit I've read in my life. What do you care what I choose to eat? What does it matter to you that I cut out wheat and bread and bleached flour and food with things in it that I can't even pronounce?

I take what I put in my body very seriously, but nowhere did I try to persuade anyone not to make their own choices. But what I did get was a whole bunch of mocking crap about making my choices. I am not a snob because of the choice not to eat Macdonalds - conversely, all those with the shitty attitude towards people who choose not to are the ones with the issue.

Oh forgot to mention - I wasn't brought up eating fast food, but had some throughout my life. In my teens, I ate Macdonalds with my friends. In my twenties, I went through a little random phase of having one occasionally - until I started consciously making decisions about my diet.

Without fail, every single time, I would physically throw up the Macdonalds, undigested. Maybe a handful of times I put it down to a stomach bug or just having an off day. But it happened enough times to see the correlation - Macdonalds makes me physically sick.

I have a high fat, high protein, low carb diet - and what carbs I do have are not white. This is very deliberate but when I was having Macdonalds, I was also still eating chips from other places, food cooked in other not-great oils, bread, pastry etc. So it wasn't that I wasn't used to the high carb, high oil content of their food.

Of course it is up to you. But if you were morally opposed to them just don't use their toilet.

And the European Court found that Steel and Morris were not afforded a fair [libel] trial in the UK.

David and Goliath, indeed.

Is it worth me mentioning again that it wasn't me that used their bog, it was my DH? Just coz we are married I don't control his shitting habits. Wish I did..

You are the McTurd One, tatty.

Ha! I will fight for the right for the ordinary man, woman and child to dump in McDonald's when the need arises..

I will always think of this thread as McDumpgate.

Liking McDumpgate linerunner. Will use it in conversation.

That's how they reel you in, starts with a McDump and before long you're on a xl big mac meal.