LOL Your Terrible Ad

[Content Note: Disablist language.]

Shaker GoldFishy emails, which I am sharing with his permission:

I remember you had a post about the Cadillac commercial. Thought you might be interested [in this]: "Remember that Cadillac ad bragging about American exceptionalism that made everyone who doesn't drive a Cadillac feel pretty bad about America? Ford can play that game, too, apparently."

"Take this, Cadillac!"—Ford.

A young black woman named Pashon Murray, a real person who is the founder of Detroit Dirt, stands with her back to the camera, looking out over a reservoir of water with dirt piled high on either side.

"Why do I work so hard?" she asks, glancing over her shoulder. "For what?" She holds out her hands, gesturing at the dirt. "For this?" She turns and looks at the camera. "For dirt?" She begins walking, in a cheeky mimic of the Cadillac ad. "Other countries, they work; they stroll to the market and buy locally-grown food. Locally. Why aren't we like that?" She looks directly into the camera. "Well, more and more of us are like that."

She walks into a greenhouse. "Because we're crazy entrepreneurs trying to make the world better." She high-fives a white male gardener working in the greenhouse as she passes him.

Cut to a cafe; she walks toward the camera as she speaks. "Some people might think we're nuts. Whatever! Me? I collect food scraps from restaurants." A black man hands her vegetable scraps as she passes him in the kitchen. "Manure from zoos." She looks at the camera. "Manure. Do you know why?"

Cut to "her home," where she speaks as she disappears into the bedroom then immediately comes out wearing a suit, just like in the Cadillac ad. "To keep this stuff out of landfills. And use it to make good, rich dirt, that's why. Yeah, look, it's pretty simple."

Cut to "her car," a white electric Ford plugged into a wall being charged. She unplugs it. "You believe that anything is possible, and you try to make the world better. You try."

Cut to inside the car, where she pushes the ignition button. "As for helping a city grow good, green, healthy vegetables, that's the upside of giving a damn."

Cut to close-up of Murray in the car. "N'est-ce pas?"

Text onscreen: Ford logo. #Upside.

Ha ha ha BOOM! Fuck you, Cadillac!

Now listen, I'm not operating under the misapprehension that Ford is actually super concerned about growing vegetables in Detroit. One commercial does not mitigate a history (and present) of shitty corporate practices.

But this doesn't meaning nothing, either. And I feel pretty happy about driving a crappy old Ford today. *wink*