burger king vs mexico

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A Burger King advertisement for new Tex-Mex style hamburgers, which features a squat Mexican draped in his country's flag and an American cowboy, has offended Mexican officials who want the spot pulled.

Mexico's ambassador to Spain said posters for the new "Texican whopper," a cheeseburger with chile and spicy mayonnaise, inappropriately display the Mexican flag, which is draped over the diminutive wrestler like a poncho.

"This advertisement denigrates the image of our country and uses improperly Mexico's national flag," Jorge Zermeno wrote in a letter to Burger King in Spain, the Reforma newspaper reported on Monday.

The ambassador contacted the local offices of Burger King after he saw the posters in Spain, Reforma said. The burger is only available in Europe, according to the paper.

Mexico has strict laws prohibiting the defamation of the flag, Zermeno said. He asked Burger King to cancel the ad campaign that "offends Mexicans and Mexico."

The Miami-based fast-food chain Burger King was not immediately available to comment.

Last year, Sweden's Absolut vodka angered many U.S. citizens with a publicity campaign in Mexico that idealized an early 19th century map showing chunks of the United States as part of Mexico. The campaign was later dropped.


Burger King to scrap ad after complaint
Wed, Apr 15 13:53 PM EDT


MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Fast food giant Burger King apologized Tuesday for an advertisement featuring a squat Mexican draped in his country's flag next to a tall American cowboy and said it would change the campaign.

Mexico's ambassador to Spain said posters released in Europe for Burger King's new Tex-Mex style "Texican whopper," a cheeseburger with chile and spicy mayonnaise, inappropriately displayed the Mexican flag, whose image is protected under national law.

The ambassador wrote a letter complaining to Burger King and requested the ad campaign be discontinued.

Burger King said the ads were meant to show a mixture of influences from the southwestern United States and Mexico, not to poke fun at Mexican culture, but said it would replace them "as soon as commercially possible."

"Burger King Corporation has made the decision to revise the Texican Whopper advertising creative out of respect for the Mexican culture and its people," it said in a statement.

"The existing campaign falls fully within the legal parameters of the United Kingdom and Spain where the commercials are being aired and were not intended to offend anyone," the company added.

A TV version of the ad shows the strapping cowboy and the pint-sized Mexican wrestler -- nicknamed "Just a Little Bit" -- living together as roommates. At one point, the American lifts up the Mexican to help him put a trophy on a high shelf.

Mexico was involved in another controversial ad campaign last year when Absolut vodka posted billboard ads in Mexico with an early 19th century map showing chunks of the United States as part of Mexico.

The campaign angered many U.S. citizens and was later dropped.

(Reporting by Mica Rosenberg; Editing by Eric Walsh)

top TEN US school according to Playboy

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Playboy magazine on Friday named the University of Miami as the top party school in the United States based on five criteria that included a nod to brainpower.

The adult magazine, which has only occasionally published the party college list in the past but will now turn it into an annual feature, ranked the schools on campus life, sports, sex and academics, or "brains," as Playboy put it.

As a last criteria, Playboy included "bikini" which combined weather, guy-to-girl ratio and cheerleaders.

But absent from the credentials were college bars and parties that exist on the fringe of campus life.

"In order to make the list, you had to be a school where fun happens, so we threw that out and went to other criteria," said Playboy Assistant Editor Rocky Rakovic.

Rakovic also said it was hard to quantify just exactly what made a good bar scene from campus to campus, because each location had its specific attributes.

"You can't say keg party at Arizona State is much better than bar crawl at (University of) Wisconsin," he explained.

On the subject of brainpower, Rakovic said that criteria was important because, after all, "you are in college for a reason, to get an education."

Judging the intelligence of U.S. university students turned into a rather scientific equation, too, using things like grade point averages, freshman retention and Princeton academic reviews, then giving them a numerical weight and averaging results.

The one surprise, Rakovic said, could be the No. 6 school University of Wisconsin because the "bikini" ranking favored schools with warm weather climates.

Playboy began ranking party colleges 20 years ago. The full list is in the magazine's May issue and on the Internet at www.playboy.com/partyschools09.

The top 10 party schools are below in order of rank:

1) University of Miami

2) University of Texas (Austin)

3) San Diego State University

4) University of Florida

5) University of Arizona

6) University of Wisconsin (Madison)

7) University of Georgia

8) Louisiana State University

9) University of Iowa

10) West Virginia University

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis: Editing by Bob Tourtellotte)

Sex sells at half price as Bangkok hit by turmoil

The go-go bars are empty and sex is on sale at half price as Bangkok's infamous red light districts suffer from a blockade of the capital's airports.

"It's high season, but now it's like low season," said Nan, a scantily-clad hostess at one deserted nightspot in the Thai capital's notorious Patpong area.

An old man played guitar and sang along to a karaoke machine inside. Outside, beneath the pink neon, about 10 women in almost identical low-cut dresses tried to drum up trade.

Although anti-government protesters have ended an eight-day siege of Bangkok's airports, the effect of Thailand's ongoing political chaos on the tourism industry is devastating.

Sex tourism is no exception. Patpong depends on foreigners to keep afloat, but as the 350,000 air travellers stranded by the airport closures rush to leave Thailand, replacements are not coming in.

"Now Thailand has a problem -- no customers," said Lam, a man who works for Nan's bar, luring tourists in off the streets by posing as a friendly Thai offering unsolicited advice on good places to go.

Lam is hopeful the trade will return to Patpong, a lurid strip of live shows and sleazy nightlife.

"It is because of the airport, but now the airport is all clear," he said.

The Tourism Authority of Thailand is not so optimistic.

The group expects incoming travellers in 2009 to be half the 14.8 million the kingdom saw last year, with word of the protests causing tourists considering a trip to Thailand to book elsewhere.

At the normally standing-room-only "ping-pong" shows, five or six women swarm each new arrival. Some are following the example of Thailand's resorts and luxury hotels by offering discounted rates.

Prostitutes offer two hours of sexual services for 800 baht (about 22 US dollars) instead of the normal 1,500 to 2,000 baht that would cost.

The airport closures also hurt Bangkok's other entertainment options, such as the famous "ladyboy" cabaret shows.

"The shutdown of the airports seriously affected our business," said Nipon Boonmasuwaran, sales and marketing manager of the Calypso show in Bangkok, where flamboyantly-dressed transvestites lip-sync and dance to famous tunes.

"Our guests have dropped 90 percent -- we have less than 50 guests in our 350-seat theatre," Nipon said.

The Calypso also cancelled its second daily showing during the November 25-December 3 chaos, when images of frustrated tourists trying to flee Thailand from a military airbase beamed around the world.

"We handed out thousands of free tickets for the stranded hotel guests in order to entertain them and hope that they would buy drinks -- otherwise we will have no business," he said.

"Since re-opening of the airports business is trickling in but very slow," adding that guests normally came from Europe -- especially the Netherlands and Belgium -- and Asian countries such as South Korea, Japan and Singapore.

The blockade may have brought in some extra trade.

American tourists Lisa Richardson, 30, and Michael Latham, 29, said they would never have come to Patpong had they not been stranded in Bangkok.

"Being stuck for an extra week convinced us to spend time and money on things we wouldn't have normally -- ping-pong shows for example," said Latham.

But he said that he felt for Thais whose livelihood was being hit, adding: "they're hurt so much worse than we are and it just hurts to see," Latham said.

Thailand was until 2005 the world's leading destination for sex tourists, when its crown was taken by Brazil, according to Interpol.

Although prostitution is officially illegal in Thailand, estimates for the number of sex workers range from 80 000 to two million women and men.

At her Patpong bar, Nan says she hopes the tourists return soon, as she sends the money she earns back to her family near the Cambodian border.

"Maybe in 15 days, a month it comes back," she said.

 article link by oddnews courtesy of watoday.com.au