HP Sauce

Through some mechanism we confess ignorance of, people actually like this commercial. They find it funny. For the record, it is not our renowned "preachiness" or "strident" nature that prevents us from enjoying the commericial. It is its utter tiresomeness.

A steer, alone in the corral, croons a love song to a steak sauce.

"Can you imagine how much I love you?
I know the only one for me—yeah!—could ever be you!
My arms won’t free you and my heart won’t try."

Ho hum.

As documented here with staggering redundancy, this is hardly a watershed of creativity. And, of course, our preachiness won't let the opportunity to denounce the ad go by unobserved.

The tagline adds a final note—an aftertaste—of offense. This sauce "makes beef sing." You see, the commercial simply offered a literal rendition of that figurative image. Because, as you all know by now, steer=beef. That walking, thinking, singing (!) animal is nothing more than a massive chunk of food. How it can make good sense to equate the slab of meat on someone's plate with a particularized animal (and a dirty, dusty one at that) is—for all our stridency—beyond us. Is the consumer supposed to think, "Finally! I am bringing two lovers together in my stomach! Eating meat is my vote in favor of Love"?

Apparently, however, this 13-year-old ad worked. A quick search turns up testimonials such as "brilliant," "damn funny," "classic."

We must redouble our efforts.

(Thanks to Dr. Rosie for the inadvertent referral.)