Coke gets it wrong

I have to say I was put off by the now-infamous Coca-Cola commercial. It made me more than uneasy — almost mad.

Before you scream racist or intolerant buffoon, let me at least make my case.
I am multicultural in the truest sense of the word.

American by birth, I grew up abroad in Papua New Guinea. My education consisted of international schools, home school, private schools and public schools.

I have friends from every continent except Antarctica, travel abroad extensively and speak more than one language.

I am the product of several, often conflicting, cultures, and I wouldn’t change a thing. I love who it has made me.

But personal diversity is one thing and national identity is another. National identity hinges on unity, on common ground, on common culture.

Now, of course culture changes over time, but it does so through the assimilation, not exaggeration, of each new perspective that is thrown into the mix.

In other words, diversity is only the first step. What is truly the mark of a beautiful, rare and profound culture is not its diversity, but if that diversity can be harnessed and melded to produce something truly new and exceptional.

It’s no coincidence that the U.S. has been deemed the melting pot of the world. Taking the best from each other in a process of cultural refinement is how societies thrive and last. It is what has made us great. I don’t want to lose that.

One might think if I am for diversity and cultural evolution, a multilingual commercial represents that and I applauded rather than booed the sentiment.

Not quite.

I’m no anthropologist or cultural theorist, but I do know that culture and language are unified and that bond cannot easily be broken. They are connected.

Culture mirrors language and vice versa. Naturally, then, language is a barrier to cultural change and assimilation, not a catalyst.

It does not promote tolerance or acceptance but rather fortifies prejudices, resentments, differences and the way things have always been.

We need a single language in this great nation because we need a common paradigm. A common stream of language is a necessity as we trickle in all the different, beautiful dyes of cultural color. A common language must be our framework and scaffold as we transform and take our great American identity through a process of metamorphosis.
I love diversity, difference and variety, but such things should bring us together, not apart.

Commercials should remind us what unifies us, not what makes us different. Let us borrow from each other, learn from each other and shape together what it means to be an American and, further, a global citizen.

We need to be able to talk to do that, and that means one language — be it English, Swahili or whatever else.

­— cgerst@indiana.edu