09 January 2010

McDonald’s pulls pig toy

Fast-food giant McDonald’s has stirred up a controversy in Singapore by omitting pig characters from its latest toy promotions.

The pig soft toy was expected to have been part of a 12-character Doraemon set depicting the animals of the Chinese zodiac calendar. Customers wanting the toy would have to pay US$2 on top of making a food purchase. But McDonald’s decided not to include the pig toy to avoid offending Muslim customers, and had a Doraemon Cupid toy in its place instead.

The move has upset Chinese customers keen on collecting all 12 toys in the series. One of them, staff nurse Daphne Koh, 26, said: “I was born in the Year of the Pig and would have collected the whole set. But without the pig, it makes no sense for me to do so.” [The Malaysian Insider] Read more [via Religious Watch]