Platypus

This is completely irrelevant to anything my site is about, but while driving this past summer I constantly heard a McDonald’s radio commercial advertising its new Premium Roast Iced Coffee.

The product is introduced through the use of two girls, both of which sound vaguely like teeny-bopper Paris Hilton imitators. The first bemoans the fact that she is getting tired of hearing the term “hot” applied to anything that is desireable or interesting; she eloquently states that “hot is so… not.”

Next, her friend gives her a new Premium Roast Iced Coffee. After one of them drinks it (I can’t tell which, their voices sound very similar,) she remarks “ooo… that’s cold.”

The second one then says “ooo… ‘that’s cold.’ I like it.”

Now, of course this is yet another attempt by McDonalds to appeal to contemporary youth by adopting their slang. I have no problem with that, because, of course, that is the ultimate goal of advertising. What in fact bothered me was that they were introducing the term “cold” as a new slang term to replace its opposite denotation, “hot.” In fact we already have a term that fulfills this function; it’s the word “cool.” People have been using it for quite some time to describe things they like. The entire premise of the advertisement is shot.

If I hear anyone using “cold” in the context McDonalds, unlikely that this may be, I will conclude that civilization is doomed.