Poor Ronald! There’s a national movement to get the McDonald’s icon, who opponents say promotes unhealthy eating habits in kids, to pack it in and head to a retirement home. Is this the winter of Ronald’s career?
“Retire Ronald” members want the crimson-mopped icon yanked from McDonald’s marketing efforts, saying he’s responsible for getting kids to eat poorly. Not Grimace! Not the Hamburglar! No, that hapless clown, Ronald. Really? If anything, we think his freakish grin and alarming makeup actually contribute to kids’ exercise, since every time he lopes across our TV screen, we want to run away!
The group’s site—which truly must be seen to be believed—suggests poor Ronald enter a “Children’s Marketing Icons Retirement Home.” We can picture it now! Grimace, wrestling with the Quizno’s Rat over the last morsel of ambrosia. Colonel Sanders, trying to look up nurses’ skirts. For some reason, the Marlboro Man is also pictured on this site, throwing back brews with Spuds McKenzie. We’re not sure how much those two appealed to kids, but we bet they’re hilarious at Friday night sing-a-longs!
Yesterday, the group staged protests at McDonald’s in Brooklyn, Portsmouth, N.H., and Burlington, VT. (Management ultimately told the Portsmouth protesters to leave.) Their motto: “For nearly 50 years no one has been better at hooking kids on unhealthy food, spurring an epidemic of diet-related disease. Ronald deserves a break, and so do we!”
He certainly has the outfit for retirement: Baggy pants, sensible shoes. And those brightly glossed lips would certainly look stylish at shuffleboard tournaments. However, he needn’t cash out his 401(k) just yet. According to a statement from McDonald’s CEO Jim Skinner: “Ronald McDonald is not retiring.”
Now if only someone could “accidentally” slip the Burger King a little something extra in his chicken fries…
Local McDonald’s Bar Protesters From Property [Seacoast Online]
