A sassy, badass white hen swaggers around a warehouse to DMX’s X Gon’ Give It To Ya. The rap-inspired video cuts to the slogan: “The chicken, the whole chicken, and nothing but the chicken,” establishing KFC’s latest TV commercial. Meg Farren, the Chief Marketing Officer of KFC, said about the advertisement: “At KFC we’re proud of our chicken, we’re not afraid to show it. ‘The Whole Chicken’ represents a step change for us, taking a bolder stance when it comes to engaging with our loyal customers and fans.”
But the new advertisement hasn’t quite worked the way the fast food company imagined it would. There is much outrage across the world over the “insensitivity” of showing a dancing chicken who will soon to be slaughtered for gastronomic pleasures. The imagery has proved too “uncomfortable” to digest. Many social media users tweeted about its “sadistic” and disturbing tone. One user tweeted, “Don’t pretend to be friends with your victims.”
More than 250 complaints were registered with the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) against the advertisement, which said that the depiction of chickens is “offensive and distressing” for vegetarians, vegans and children, and that it is “misleading” because it features a healthy, older looking chicken that probably misrepresents the age, quality and living conditions of KFC chickens.
However, not everyone is opposed to the idea at the centre of the advertisement. Some fans found it a work of “genius”, echoing the thoughts of the KFC spokesperson who pointed out, “Our fans know that when they eat with us it’s all about the chicken, the whole chicken and nothing but the chicken, so seeing one in our ad shouldn’t come as a surprise!”
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