Burger King Uses New Ad to Lecture Us about Net Neutrality

Not content to just make sub-par burgers for people in a hurry, Burger King has waded into politics. In a new commercial, the company lectures customers about how the Trump-led GOP was wrong to repeal net neutrality.

Many people are confused about net neutrality and what its repeal means. For liberals, the repeal means that evil corporations will indiscriminately throttle the speed of some websites and not others. As the solution, they want the government to oversee the internet. Apparently, Burger King is a benevolent corporation and is on the side of government heavy-handedness oversight. To help their customers learn the truth about net neutrality, Burger King set up hidden cameras in a restaurant and then proceeded to waste customers’ time with an unneeded object lesson.

In the commercial, Burger King changes megabytes per second (MBPS) to “making burgers per second.” A sign in the restaurant offering a Whopper MBPS provided three options: 1. Slow MBPS for $4.99. 2. Fast MBPS for $12.99. 3. Hyperfast MBPS for $25.99.

In the commercial, customers — real customers — became increasingly agitated as they were forced to wait for their Whopper because they didn’t pay for either of the two faster Whopper MBPS speeds. At one point, a Burger King employee holds a Whopper in his hand while he counts down the final 42 seconds before he’s allowed to put the burger in the customer’s bag.

The customers were obviously unhappy with the absurdity of the “new rules.” Letting his frustration and incredulity show, one customer pleaded, “This is a bad dream right now. I just want a burger!”

Interviewed outside of the store after their Whopper MBPS experience, the customers reflected on how they now have a better understanding of why repealing net neutrality was a bad idea.

Admittedly, net neutrality is a complicated discussion, and few of us, including myself, have a decent enough handle on it to declare the absolute high ground over the issue. For me, in a nutshell, I lean toward supporting President Trump and the GOP’s decision to repeal net neutrality because I’m wary of allowing the internet to be caged in by liberals as a public utility. One thing that I’m sure of, though, is that I don’t want businesses smugly lecturing me on the issue under the guise of a commercial. Burger King should stick to making fast food and leave politics alone. Like many other businesses, it seems that Burger King is intent on alienating conservative customers.