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One of the town’s biggest defenders of personal freedoms has this week blown a fuse over the idea that a multinational dairy company might want to change their name.
This comes as the iconic Coon Cheese has been renamed Cheer Cheese, after decades of Australians pretending to ignore the rather obvious racist connotations associated with the word.
While in context, the outgoing brand was actually named after one of their products initial founders whose German surname was ‘Coon’ – as this slur wasn’t common place in Australia at that time.
This has outraged Betoota Grove boomer Paul Carne (61) who has taken a moment from being outraged by how outraged everyone gets these days to instead focus his outrage on this cheese company changing their name.
“You can’t do anything nowadays” says Paul, apparently not in reference to the cheese company who wanted to no longer be confused for a racial slur against black people.
“Everyone is so quick to get offended. They want to be offended.”
“This is has really pissed me off”
But it hasn’t just pissed Paul off, it’s actually done his head in.
He hasn’t slept a win in three nights, as he comes to term with the fact that the world he grew up in during the prosperous post-war economic boom can’t stay exactly the same forever.
“Why does everything have to change”
“Peoples feelings being hurt by seeing a word that gets yelled at them in the school yard as kids aren’t as important as my feelings being hurt by a couple letters being changed around in a cheese brand that I sometimes buy”
Paul has since vowed to no longer buy this specific brand of cheese, which will not really have much affect on the bottom line now that they are likely to attract quite a few more consumers after making the executive decision to no longer have a horrible racial slur plastered across all of their packaging.
The rebrand has began rolling out across supermarkets across the country, according to a press release from the company today.
“Our decision to change the name of Australia’s much-loved cheese reinforces this commitment to build a culture of acceptance, inclusion and respect where everyone feels a sense of belonging.” read the press release.
While the decision might appear to be a bit behind the times, the company is taking the opportunity to pat themselves on the back for doing the right thing by Indigenous community – many of whom pay four times as much as the rest of the nation to even buy this product in remote communities.
