A Canadian woman who’s sister has autism and cerebral palsy opened a bottle of Coca-Cola’s Vitamin Water to find a message in the bottle cap: “You Retard.”
A company promotion pairs a random English word with a random French word to create a short phrase that can often be humorous—but in this case it offended. “Retard” is a French word meaning late.
Coca-Cola has apologized and ended the promotion.
Doug Loates was outraged. He is the father of the woman who found the message and of her 11-year-old disabled sister, Fiona.
Loates has two 11-year-old girls (they were triplets, but the third died when she was just days old). He also has two grown daughters from his first marriage, including Blake, his oldest, who found the message. He wrote a letter to Coca-Cola published by the Consumerist (see letter below).
“[Fiona] has had 22 surgeries. She has Cerebral Palsy and still gets fed with a feeding tube. She is cognitively delayed. Fifty years ago thy might have called her retarded. But we know better now, don’t we?”
