“I pass this billboard every day on my way home from work,” says our submitter from Tennessee. “Apparently, some tax breaks were given for Volkswagen to build a plant here in Chattanooga, which will eventually bring thousands of jobs to this area. This group is upset that not EVERYONE who is involved in constructing the plant was born in the United States.”
A side note from Ana in Guatemala (fifth flag from the left): “Guatemala is a very beautiful — albeit dangerous — country. Crime rates are through the roof, but in this small American-run inn, hope prevails…mostly.”
related: America the not-so-beautiful
183 responses so far ↓
#1
sleeps
Wow…most expensive PAN ever?
Apr 21, 2010 at 12:17 am rating: 48
#2
kewlito
Extra info: The flag over VENEZUELA is for URUGUAY.
Apr 21, 2010 at 12:21 am rating: 103
#3
César
Yeah, I’m venezuelan and I was like wait…
So either they didn’t know the name of the country for the flag they’d gotten and said, fuck it, use whatever name comes up. Or they had Venezuela but couldn’t find the flag and said, fuck it, slap any flag on there. They won’t notice.
Apr 21, 2010 at 12:28 am rating: 40
#4
Justin Clemens
That’s how well educated are these chauvinist bastards
Apr 21, 2010 at 12:45 am rating: 7
#5
Canthz_B
99.9% of the bags are safe?
Are .1% left by al qaeda?
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:13 am rating: 17
#6
Canthz_B
I like the second poster best.
I’m always impressed when someone is willing to go that extra 1/16 of a mile to go bilingual.
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:17 am rating: 25
#7
Blogmella
You can’t blame the people of Tennessee for being shocked – After all, who would expect a good ol’ company like Volkswagen to employ people from” Other Countries”? They’re as American as momma’s apple Krapfen!
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:38 am rating: 75
#8
park rose
Well, if note-writers one had invested as much capital as note-writers two did, then they too would have a solid block-lettered sign promising only a .1% chance of failure (pardon my maths, there).
What does it all mean? I don’t know I just wanted to get into a UPPER CASE vs lower case argument. Those lower cases are just so vulgar sometimes.
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:52 am rating: 3
#9
John
My parents are immigrants who came to the US for economic opportunity. From what they tell me of their early days here, they found it to be a welcoming place… so much so that half a century later they are still here and consider it their true home, and raised their family here.
Of course, they are non-Hispanic white people.
Apr 21, 2010 at 3:05 am rating: 25
#10
claw71
I can’t speak on behalf of all Americans but I’m pretty sure I’d like Tennessee a lot more if we could replace all of its native inhabitants with people of foreign origin. Can’t we earmark some stimulus money for that undertaking?
By the way, did anybody else notice the flag that’s cut off on the right is Poland’s? How’s that for a blow to the self esteem? How many Polacks does it take to build a Volkswagen plant? I don’t know either but they beat the hell out of your typical Tennessean!
Apr 21, 2010 at 7:54 am rating: 26
#11
StopDaveStopDaveDaveStop
You are right. I stand ashamed and corrected:
“This follows on the heels of previouisly reported incidents; such as Volkswagen setting aside two days a week for “non-English speaking employee orientation;” and the discovery of workers on the job from countries such as Venezuela, Nicaragua, Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, and Poland.”
http://www.volunteersforlocalhire.com/News.aspx?nID=7665
Apr 21, 2010 at 8:52 am rating: 1
#12
AaronD
On their website they say that workers are coming from other countries including Puerto Rico.
You’d think such patriotic folks would be more familiar with their own country’s territorial holdings.
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:08 am rating: 29
#13
claw71
You’d never get away with a sign like that last one here in the US. 99.9% is very specific and implies that studies were conducted to arrive at such a precise figure. You’d have to provide the data that proves the bags are 99.9% safe and document the instances in which the bags were most likely to become unsafe.
Meanwhile, in other countries they can make all kinds of crazy claims. Like the guy on the beach at Nassau who told me he was going to roll me a ‘Bob Marley spliff’ for $20. I asked him how big this spliff was and he said “It’s a Bob Marley spliff, man.” And then he pantomimed something on the order of a foot-long torpedo doob.
Of course when he came back with my megaroach it was more like a Miley Cyrus slim-teen tampon, and after I torched up I was treated to a fireworks display as the seeds and stems exploded in my jay.
The moral of the story is that you’re probably going to find better weed at your local college campus.
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:11 am rating: 12
#14
Nick
So a group of upset, presumably unemployed (or ‘volunteers’) decides the best way to parlay whatever meagre earnings they have is to pay for a huge billboard. Oh well, I wonder if the bill-sticker was from Poland, too…
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:16 am rating: 6
#15
kthejoker
So did anyone else notice the second sign says
“Please leave YOUR YOUR bags here”
It’s like one of those old “spot the error” puzzles from Ripley’s Believe it Or Not!
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:23 am rating: 18
#16
shwonline
In the second sign, is that a double period or ellipsis interruptus?
Apr 21, 2010 at 10:31 am rating: 4
#17
Sam S
So they are 99.9% certain of something, but they won’t guarantee it?!
Is this a restaurant or a used car lot?
Apr 21, 2010 at 11:06 am rating: 5
#18
hailster
UGH!
this isn’t a Tennessee issue, its a frickin’ education/natural selection FAIL.
I’m going to have to start spiking water supplies with birth control and poison.
Apr 21, 2010 at 11:08 am rating: 7
#19
claw71
CB did bring up a great point earlier. The people who lean toward the tea party’s alleged values are often the same people who throw tantrums when an ethnic group, particularly if that group has darker skin, celebrates their ethnicity with parties that feature flags representative of that ethnic group’s country of origin. Most of the Euro centric celebrations are acceptable but fly a flag from Central or South America and watch the vitriol fly.
Of all the flags we see people sporting, the one that has always perplexed me is the confederate flag. The Civil War wasn’t just about slavery but that atrocity is heinous enough to overshadow everything else the south stood for. Southerners will tell you that the “War Between the States was about economics and states’ rights but the primary economic issue was the elimination of slave labor and the rights the states were most concerned with was the right to determine the legality of keeping slaves.
The NAZIs were about much more than exterminating Jews and Hitler was not a simple tyrant motivated by genocide. In fact, the NAZI movement was more removed from the Holocaust than the Confederacy was from the issue of slavery. Nevertheless the NAZI flag is taboo and the swastika, a symbol that existed long before the NAZIs appropriated it for evil, is considered obscene while the flags and symbols of the South are alive, well and adorning many public buildings throughout the country…a country, mind you, that the people those symbols represented opposed.
To me the Confederate flag is just as objectionable as the NAZI flag and when it comes to the issue of patriotism I think celebrating the Confederacy borders on an act of treason.
Apr 21, 2010 at 11:33 am rating: 22
#20
Marishka
Hey! The Venezuela flagf is not that one!! That’s the flag of my country, Uruguay!
We would hope if they’re going to be fo xenophobes they would at least try to get a stupid sign right.
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:40 pm rating: 2
#21
mamason
I got nothin’.
Apr 21, 2010 at 1:43 pm rating: 1
#22
uruguaya
That is NOT Venezuela’s flag!!! ay, ay, ay, dear Americans… with sooooo many children left behind…
Apr 21, 2010 at 2:03 pm rating: 3
#23
mamason
Correct me if I’m wrong, but that is NOT Venezuela’s flag!!! I’m surprised no one noticed that before now.
Apr 21, 2010 at 2:13 pm rating: 12
#24
infant tyrone
If it ain’t Venezuela’s flag then the next thing
uruguayan to tell me is is ain’t P/A either ?
Apr 21, 2010 at 2:31 pm rating: 5
#25
Denny DelVecchio
It’s a freaking GERMAN car company for God’s sake.
Put the nationalism back in your holster, Buford F. Tennesseean.
Apr 21, 2010 at 5:09 pm rating: 10
#26
Love My Daily PAN
That Venezuelan flag was fucking delicious.
Apr 21, 2010 at 8:32 pm rating: 1
#27
anglophile
Am I the only one who was so annoyed with the stupid serifs on the ms, ns and hs on the font to go looking for it?
I am?
It’s Equinox. It’s like stupid 7th grade writing in font. Perfect for a PA billboard, I guess.
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:03 pm rating: 5
#28
Shiva
It’s cute that Tennessee is so pissed off over foreigners getting jobs at a Volkswagen plant.
It’s great that Americans get jobs at a German car plant, but it’s not OK for a Venezuelan to get a job in Tennessee…Assholes.
Apr 21, 2010 at 9:28 pm rating: 6
#29
Nick
Wtf? POLAND?
That’s such a random country to bitch about.
Apr 21, 2010 at 11:33 pm rating: 1
#30
FoxtrotAlpha
I wonder if it’s dawning on the Volunteers in hindsight that they can’t trust big business? Give ‘em all the giant tax breaks and loop holes they can handle, then the do whatever the fuck they want. I bet the Volunteers are all still marching around down there talking about the eeeevils of the Government. Less regulation ya’ll!
Apr 22, 2010 at 7:09 am rating: 2
#31
Rossy
I like how being racist is different than being biased against everyone who lives in the south. Oh wait, it’s actually not…
Apr 22, 2010 at 2:39 pm rating: 2
#32
M
Worst part is, the countries don’t match the flags on the billboard, the flag over Venezuela, is actually the flag of Uruguay… Maybe that’s why VW did not hire the “Volunteers”, sloppy work?
Apr 28, 2010 at 6:45 pm rating: 1
#33
Shiva
Yes.
Apr 28, 2010 at 7:46 pm rating: 0
#34
Stephanie
I love that the flag depicted as Venezuela’s actually belongs to Uruguay.
May 12, 2010 at 6:42 am rating: 1
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