10% More Free
I opened my freezer this evening and grabbed a bag of chicken nuggets. I pulled some out to heat in the oven when I noticed an interesting label on the front of the package: “10% More Free.”
I sat and stared at this interesting sight. “Wow, Tyson is so generous. They have decided to fill an average package of chicken nuggets with 32 ounces, but out of their generosity, they are giving me 35.2 ounces. What a deal.”
How puerile do they think the consumer is? How can you arbitrarily set a standard just to make yourself look better? It’s absurd and offensive. Tell me what the package contains, not how wonderful you are.
And then I thought, “Dang, we all do that.” We arbitrarily set low standards in our lives and beat them, all the while proclaiming how great we are for beating this standard. No one would say a man is good because he doesn’t beat his wife 95% of the time. Only saying one mean thing a day doesn’t equate to being good.
Why should we expect to be “good” because we are better than some low expectation? Having 10% more free doesn’t mean the package is better. It just means you’re trying to inflate your goodness.
A standard exists, so why waste our time with labels and definitions of personal goodness? Why try to place yourself in a position where you “seem” better than you are. Measured up to that standard, you fail so miserably, and in the process, you have only wasted your time trying to make yourself seem better.