November 10, 2022

"The German branch of KFC has apologised after inviting customers to commemorate the Kristallnacht pogrom of 1938 by ordering a fried chicken dish."

The London Times reports.

Under the subject line “Memorial day for the Reich pogrom night”, KFC Germany wrote: “Go ahead and treat yourself to more soft cheese on your crispy chicken. Now available at KFCheese.”... 

It is unclear whether the message can be attributed to a hack, an internal prank, sloppily coded software or a mortifying lapse of judgment by an employee.

44 comments:

Michael K said...

Short memories, like our millennials.

Ted said...

At first I thought this must be a hack, but international KFCs actually are promoting a cheese sauce meant to be poured over everything, including fried chicken. (I'll let somebody else make the Mel Brooks-style jokes about how this product is worse than H@tler.)

rhhardin said...

Kristallnacht sounds Christmasy. Silent night combined with frankincense and myrrh.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

It is unclear whether the message can be attributed to a hack, an internal prank, sloppily coded software or a mortifying lapse of judgment by an employee.

...or clever marketing ploy.

We'll need to wait for the sales figures to know for sure.

Mike Sylwester said...

The atrocity here is putting soft cheese on crispy chicken.

Saint Croix said...

Kanye West is an artist who pushes the envelope and gets reactions from other people.

A while back he said this...

“I can say antisemitic shit and Adidas cannot drop me."

That was a lesson.

But think about the lesson for a second. What I love about this tweet is that he is daring the Germans to prove him wrong. And they proved him wrong. West gave them the opportunity to be a hero. He's "playing" a villain and seeing what they will do.

Trump does this all the time!

It's an art move. When you have a lot of power and success, it can go to your head and make you an awful person. (See also Mel Gibson). But sometimes provoking people causes people to improve. The whole ministry of Jesus involved him provoking authority. This is important because authorities often fuck up.

Anyway, Adidas decided to be heroic. They burned some money and cut West loose. We can all spit on Kanye now, but I think it's entirely possible (maybe even likely) that he wanted the authorities to do what's right. He cares more about that than money. If he cared most about money, he would have kept his mouth shut. I'm sure he likes money (we all do!) but honesty is more important to him.

tim in vermont said...

Nazis are flavor of the month, doncha know.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

""The German branch of KFC has apologised after inviting customers to commemorate the Kristallnacht pogrom of 1938 by ordering a fried chicken dish.""

Shorter KFC Germany:

"What's the difference between a chicken and a Jew?"

(Please don't ban me; it's the very first thing that popped into my head the instant I read the headline. Ted opened the door.)

Owen said...

Each order comes with a complimentary bowl of broken glass.

n.n said...

Planned Poultryhood (PP) is a choice taken by people... persons to supply a productive protein and sate a dietician's palate.

Planned Jewhood (PJ) was a Choice taken by rabid diversitists to relieve a viable "burden" and stock a clinician's ambition.

rcocean said...

wouldn't chicken soup be more appropriate?

rcocean said...

Silent Kristallnacht brings back christmassy memories.

rcocean said...

Tag Line: I'd crawl over broken glass for a KFC chicken.

n.n said...

Nazis are flavor of the month, doncha know.

It happened in darkness, under a veil of privacy. The same cannot be said for slavery, diversity, and wicked solutions now. As long as people... persons betray introspection for secular gratification and political poultry, forevermore.

n.n said...

"What's the difference between a chicken and a Jew?"

Capitalization? A chicken is aborted for diet, while a Jew would be aborted for DIET (Diversity, Inequity, and Exclusion Theory).

mccullough said...

Does the Colonel’s visage on a bucket in Berlin have a monocle?

I mean, we aren’t even exporting them our better fast food.

Is Taco Bell offering 2 tacos for the price of one to Commemorate the Reichstag Fire.

Then again, inflation is so bad here that we can only afford fast food on our solemn days of commemoration.

Is Burger King giving any deals to commemorate Veterans Day tomorrow?

Commemorate December 7th, a day that will live in infamy, at In-N-Out

Enigma said...

Obvious prank. It'd have been covered as joke 20 years ago.

People reprogram freeway construction signs all the time. People mess with billboards all the time.


Lurker21 said...

Don't blame the software. It doesn't write the tweets. Yet. Or at least I hope it doesn't.

Outsiders needle America about this. The day we set aside to honor the war dead is known for sales and specials more than for anything else.

The Holocaust, though, still counts as important -- though apparently, to some people, it's as memorable as the already forgotten wars of the 19th century.

Germans. So much to remember. So much to forget. It's hard to keep track of what's what.

james said...

If it was a real corporate post:
I could almost see it if the offering were kosher, but even then -- reminding you of your ancestors' guilt would tend to inspire fasting instead of eating out.

On the other hand:
Perhaps someone was sick to death of being reminded of his ancestors' guilt and wanted to thumb his nose at somebody, and thought cracking a KFC account would be a hoot.

Or maybe there are a few old die-hards, or new imports, who hate Jews.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I don’t get it.

MikeR said...

What's offensive, mixing meat and milk? KFC isn't kosher anyhow.

BobJustBob said...

Remember when PETA compared chickens to Jews and the Holocaust?

Aggie said...

I don't get it either. Maybe they meant 'Krispynacht'?

madAsHell said...

Poor white Methodist here.

Does not mixing dairy with meat extend to chickens??

It kinda shoots down my theory of Mexicans being one of the lost tribes of Israel. My tin-foil-hat needs a tune-up.

Bunkypotatohead said...

Novemberfest!

n.n said...

KFC national or transnational?

GRW3 said...

It just sounds like a screw up, surely not intentional. With the holiday season upon us, Kristalnacht might have sounded very seasonal. It's the kind of screw up like might happen in the south where the intention might be to honor the Tuskegee Airmen and think ahead software might jump in and suggest Experiment, just a TAB away from disaster.

n.n said...

Another back... black hole... whore incident prosecuted for social justice, corporate profit, and political leverage.

Howard said...

Soft Cheese on Crispy Chicken? Definitely anti-Kosher

PM said...

They should just invent a St Colonel's Day and run with that.

Mary Beth said...

Sure, sure, KFC, do something for Kristallnacht, but nothing for the Armenian genocide.

Mary Beth said...

It just sounds like a screw up, surely not intentional. With the holiday season upon us, Kristalnacht might have sounded very seasonal.

Except they didn't call it Kristallnacht, they called it Reichspogromnacht.

This is what happens when you hire your app coders through Fiverr.

gilbar said...

to be fair, the KFC bots, said that they 'Were Just Following Orders'
But we can't punish the Colonel; 'cause he's already dead (or is he Actually ALIVE and living in Argentina?)

sprx said...

Too soon?

Lawrence Person said...

"KFC is shattering the windows between you and flavor!"

gpm said...

>>"What's the difference between a chicken and a Jew?"

I suspect this is a variation of a pretty vile joke I heard some 50 years ago, where a pizza served in place of the chicken. Won't repeat the punch line.

--gpm

Narr said...

Every day is Auschwitz for chickens.

Tasty, tasty chickens.

Saint Croix said...

What's dangerous is the Harvey Weinstein move, where you pretend to be a good person in public, and you do awful shit in private.

If Harvey was more honest in his public tweets ("I fuck little girls in my office, and nobody can stop me"), people would have stopped him a long time ago.

Christians talk about the importance of confession, making your private sins public. Consider the possibility that when you are in the afterlife, all your private sins are now public. Everybody knows what you did. There is nowhere to hide.

Secrecy is what we use to protect our reputation in this world. But Christ wants us thinking about the next world. So it's better to burn your reputation in this world ("I did it, I'm sorry") and save your ass in the next.

You know HR people are doing evil shit when they object to their secret meetings being recorded. If you can't stand being photographed or video-taped while you do shit, you might think about why that is.

Saint Croix said...

The Jews were chosen by God to give birth to a messiah who will save the world.

It's a mixed blessing to be chosen by God, as it will cause you suffering in this world. But you will be highly blessed in the next.

One way to spot the people who are hating on God in their hearts, is to look for the people who hate Jews. Always a good sign of somebody who hates God.

Consider the possibility that the Holy Spirit helped Mel Gibson make his wonderful movie, and then abandoned him to go elsewhere and help other people. And so Mel Gibson reverted to a sinner. People who wrestle with spiritual demons are more vulnerable to spiritual demons. (Gibson, of course, knows he's a sinner).

Saint Croix said...

On another thread I talk about how many Jews think the apostle John was anti-Semitic.

Here's what John has to teach us about the killing of Jesus...

John 10:14-18:

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away -- and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me. Just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be on flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father."

The Christian church has long called the killing of Jesus "Good Friday." I believe with all my heart that the Holy Spirt instructed those early Christians to understand that the Jews did not kill Christ; the Romans did not kill Christ. Jesus sacrificed himself for us all.

Worldly people who want to avenge Jesus are not Christians in any sense of the word.

Saint Croix said...

Hitler was Satanic, and one possible explanation for what he did was that he wanted to kill all the Jews (similar to what Herod did 2,000 years ago on a smaller scale -- the Massacre of the Innocents) because he was trying to keep the Jewish messiah from being born and challenging his power.

Hitler rejected the idea that Christ was the messiah, in other words, but he apparently still believed the Jews were a threat to his power.

This is just a theory; we can't really know the heart of a madman.

Saint Croix said...

It's always rather shocking to see how few Jews there are in the world. And yet people still feel threatened by them. That's because the Jews represent God in their minds.

Do not be afraid to be Jewish. Follow Moses, follow Elijah, and you are on the path of Christ.

veni vidi vici said...

Revealed: Kyrie Irving is the owner of several German KFC franchises.

Old and slow said...

Cheese on chicken is not so much international as it is German or continental. KFC Ireland does not offer this cheese.