Walmart ad is both insulting and a lie

There is a new Walmart ad that has been running on TV in recent weeks, an ad that is identified as “many chairs, one table.”

In this new minute-long Walmart video ad, we see a montage of people, each of them grabbing a distinctly different chair. At one point music begins in the ad, which is a 1967 hit song from the band The Youngbloods, Get Together.

The chorus line for the Youngbloods song is, “come on people now, smile on your brother. Everybody get together, try to love one another right now.” We see a diverse group of people gathering their chairs and eventually they all end up at a large table outside, sharing food and enjoying this beautiful communal gathering.

It’s bad enough for Walmart to use this popular culture song from the 60s, but it is even more offensive that this corporation would use a community food sharing image, considering how Walmart is fundamentally about the business of exploitation.

Here are just a few examples of how Walmart takes advantage of people and communities:

• Wal-Mart is the wealthiest company in the world with over $14 billion in profits last year alone. The company makes that kind of an annual profit because it has destroyed many local businesses and pays its workers poverty level wages. In 2008, Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott Jr. made a $29,682,000 salary, which is 1,314 times more than the salary of an average full-time Wal-Mart worker.
• If Wal-Mart paid its workers a livable wage they could seriously reduce the number of people needing.
• Wal-Mart gets millions in tax breaks every year from communities across the country when they broker deals to build new stores. In addition, Wal-Mart use state and federal tax loopholes to pay less in taxes and gets all kinds of subsidies from local communities where they build new stores. 
• Wal-Mart is a company, like any other company, that is committed to maximizing their profits. You cannot simultaneously end hunger and make a profit. Besides not paying workers in the US a livable wage, Walmart profits off the misery of millions globally by selling products made in sweatshop conditions. 
• Walmart’s board of directors is made up of a group of economic elites who are also committed to maximizing profits and maintaining inter-corporate relations, which allows them to be a united front against government and public scrutiny.  
• Walmart is one of the largest food retailers in the world and a great deal of the food they sell uses exploited farmworker labor. While Walmart does not hire migrant farmworkers, they do benefit from the exploitative migrant labor used within the agricultural sector. This is exactly why the Grand Rapids Cosecha Movement is involved in a boycott campaign against Walmart, because the corporation profits from the current food system that is so dependent on the use of migrant farmworkers.

Walmart, like the economic system of capitalism, does not want people to “get together” or “love one another” now or anytime for that matter. Don’t believe the Walmart bullshit. Boycott Walmart!