The Order of the Sons and Daughters of Italy in America are upset with the new Wendy’s commercial promoting their new parmesan caesar salad due to bad Italian American stereotyping and are demanding an apology. Should Wendy’s remove the ad? We discuss it on Chasing News.

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Italian group outraged over Wendy’s salad commercial

May 15th, 2019

Bill Spadea: Check out this Wendy’s commercial.

Commercial: This Wendy’s salad is really good. What’s that supposed to mean? This Wendy’s salad is really good. You know it tastes good. No, we don’t know the salads don’t taste good.

Bill Spadea: Featuring the fast food restaurants Parmesan Caesar Salad.

Commercial: You wearing a wire kid? Guys, it’s just Wendy’s new Parmesan Caesar. It really is good. Get him out of here.

Bill Spadea: So, did you find it funny? Is it harmless? Well, the order of the Sons and Daughters of Italy in America don’t think so. As a matter of fact, they think it’s bad Italian American stereotyping and they want an apology from Wendy’s and they want the ad pulled. Let’s bring in tonight’s A plus panel. Afia Yunus, Immigration Attorney and Bob Bianchi, former Prosecutor and Attorney and maybe more importantly, Bob, you’re the second Vice President of the Sons and Daughters of Italy in America.

Robert Bianchi: Yes, I am.

Bill Spadea: All right, so I didn’t find it offensive. I kind of felt it was right in line with the Soprano’s. Its 20th anniversary. Is it? Is it really that big a deal?

Robert Bianchi: The Italian Americans in my opinion, are the last acceptable social prejudice, that you could come out with a commercial like that and think it would be okay characterizing them like buffoons, morons, and crime figures.

Bill Spadea: So, Afia, to Bob’s point, if this were a Muslim commercial, if they were featuring Muslims, if they made any you know, joke about terrorism, there would be an outcry.

Afia Yunus: Absolutely there would be outrage. I mean, I can’t even imagine that happening in, in today’s age.

Bill Spadea: Do you agree with Bob?

Afia Yunus: I mean, I do. I think if there’s sensitivity there, then we as a society need to be sensitive to it.

Bill Spadea: Or have we just devolved into a humorless society that can’t poke fun at anybody.

Robert Bianchi: Bill, to your point, I put this out on Facebook. Okay. And a majority, I would say other responses back to me, I was just talking about the double standard was, oh, it’s just a joke. These are from Italians. It’s no big deal. And I understand that. And I do believe we become too politically correct, but I can tell you from firsthand experience, my father can tell you instances in which we were looked at with suspicion as law enforcement officers have people ever public servants when people making comments like, Oh, you guys are probably connected. You guys are probably in the mob, things like this, and you know what? It hurts our professional career and we’re the only group where this is allowed to occur without anybody being concerned.

Bill Spadea: We reached out to Wendy’s, and we made contact with someone in their corporate office, but they did not issue a statement.