Kitchen Nightmares = PR Nightmares

I've just been tuned into the new show on Fox, Kitchen Nightmares with Gordon Ramsay. I also watched some of the original show from British television. After watching this show all I have to say is WOW. I can't believe there are such ignorant people in the world. In the show Gordon Ramsay visits various local restaurants that have been started up by a variety of individuals. He critiques the restaurant in order to try to fix the problems he sees affecting their business. A good number of the restaurant managers and owners have no idea what they are doing and have flung themselves into the business without any doing any sort of research. Ramsay, who has opened restaurants throughout the U.K., tries to help the owners by fixing all the mistakes they have made in the past. He shows them how to fix the menus, the decor, the staff, the communication between employees and the food. Essentially, he's helping them with public relations. Almost none of the new business owners did anything to get the word out about their new restaurants. I guess they watched Field of Dreams too many times. "If you build it, they will come." Sorry honey, doesn't work that way. The new owners just decided on a menu, a decor, a price and opened up shop. They didn't take their publics into consideration at all. So Ramsay has to come along and slap them into reality. He goes out and talks to the public to find out what they look for in an eating establishment and what they have heard about the particular restaurant in question. He takes out samples to pass out, encourages people to come in and in one episode, puts advertisements on buses. The entire time I was watching the show I kept thinking to myself, "Have these people never heard of public relations before or what?" To me it seems so obvious but it never occurred to them. I guess I've just begun to assume that the idea of public relations is common knowledge; that everyone knows what public relations is. But, I need to take into consideration that I am a PR major and that it's only common to me because I have studied it. The show was infuriating to me. I just can't believe there are such ignorant people in the world. People who have no idea how the world works. People who sink half a million dollars into a restaurant without doing the research first.

ENRON

I'm still trying to figure out how ENRON managed to hide its dirty secrets for so long. It seems to me that someone would've figured it out earlier. What's even more shocking to me is how many other corporations, Arthur Andersen included, were willing to go along with ENRON for so long. This is really a scary situation to fathom. I really wonder how many other companies are engaging in similar practices. I sincerely hope none but I doubt my hopes are realistic. I am however glad that Skilling and the other executives were punished for their crimes. Our society puts so much emphasis on street crimes and often ignores the white collar crime taking place in large corporations. I think we need to rethink this mindset. White collar crime involves much larger amounts of money and many more people. We need to focus on eliminating loopholes for companies to exploit. Including deregulation. I can't understand why anyone would see the deregulation of commodities as a good idea. No one should have the ability to play God with the prices of things our society depends on. It is essential that the government have the ability to control the prices of things that we can't live without. I understand that we are a capitalist society and that we support the ideas of a free market but its impossible to have a truly free market when there are people like Jeffrey Skilling and Ken Lay willing to play God. There are too many greedy people in the world to trust in a truly free market. There will always be someone out there trying to exploit the freedom of a free market. Especially alarming were the rolling blackouts in California caused purposefully by ENRON. Hearing the traders laugh about the fires and the accidents was life altering. I can't believe there is such selfishness in the world. This really makes me wary of working for corporate America. I just don't know if I'm tough enough.

Conflicts of Interest

After reading the New York Times article "In Diabetes Fight, Raising Cash and Keeping Trust" all I have to say is WTF mate. I really can't believe that the American Diabetes Association has really been bought out. I had never realized before reading the article how many of our public health charities have probably been bought out by corporate America. I guess I've just never really thought about it before. I've always trusted the stamps of approval from these charities, that are slapped on their Corporate sponsor's products, without questioning. It's crazy for me to fathom it really. I mean, now that I think about it it makes sense, I mean, the democratic process has been bought so why not charities... but seriously? I just can't believe that the A.D.A. would even consider lining up behind Burger King. Don't get me wrong, I love BK, but we all know it's horrible for you. That's why we like it. Sometimes you just want a big, juicy burger. They shouldn't be patted on the back for offering healthy products because they should have already been offering healthier choices. They have a responsibility to their customers to offer healthier products. I was amazed by the quotes from A.D.A. executives justifying their behavior and claiming that the money wasn't affecting their integrity as a reliable source for information. I seriously doubt that the money has no effect. If someone gives you money you in turn owe them something. It's just kind of how our society works. Companies don't just give away money for nothing. They want something in return. Being the daughter of a diabetic, and probably a diabetic in the making, I'm really disappointed that I can't trust the A.D.A. Their stamp of approval has no meaning to me as of this moment. I only wish more people would come to this realization. Things can't change until people understand what is going on and get angry about it. We need to start getting angry.