Does spending time with your family mean you hate America? This car commercial says yes.

I was watching the Olympics this weekend and saw a commercial from Cadillac that really took me by surprise.  The Olympics is full of flag-waving, good 'ol America-loving commercials.  Images of chicken mcnugget eaters cheering on the home team, people chanting USA into their cellphones, weird dog and horse love affairs playing out out on the American prairie.  It's the Olympics, time to be proud of our country and for advertisers to use that pride to sell their products.  That's the American way... But this commercial for Cadillac just rubbed me the wrong way:

First of all, I have no problem with Cadillacs.  They're great cars.  In fact, they're the Cadillac of cars.  But what is this commercial telling us?  That we should value stuff over spending time with our families?  I don't get it.

At first I thought they were going to make a statement against our insane workaholic culture:

Why do we work so hard? For what? For this? For Stuff? Other countries... they work, stroll home... they stop by the cafe.  They take August off. Off! Why aren't you like that? Why aren't WE like that?

Alright, you've got my attention.  You're right!  We DO work too hard!  Why DON'T we spend more time with our families?  What are we really working for anyway if we don't have time to enjoy it?... but then the commercial takes a strange turn:

The man rushes through his expensively furnished, yet cold and sterile living room.  He barely acknowledges his children (aside from an unemotional high-five) who are buried in an ipad and some sort of independent project. He begins to rant about how Americans are born to work hard:

We're crazy driven hard-working believers!  Those other countries think we're nuts... whatever.

Well, you kind of look nuts... especially as you hand off a newspaper to your hot wife without a word or even a knowing glance.  I suppose she's on her way to "yoga" to meet up with her "trainer" who will probably give her the attention she's looking for. As this maniac continues to march to his bedroom to get dressed for battle, er, work, he's spewing names of great Americans like the Wright Brothers, Bill Gates. Muhammad Ali and other patriots that supposedly never took a minute of focus away from their life's mission to connect with the people around them. (I'm sure they would all beg to differ)

It's pretty simple. You work hard, you create your own luck and you gotta believe anything is possible.  As for all the stuff... that's the upside for only taking 2 weeks off in August.

Barf. I certainly believe in hard work.  There's a pride that comes from an honest day's work and knowing that you have done your very best.  I'm very proud to have worked my ass off to become successful and provide a good life for my family. But that's why I do it... not for the "stuff".

Honestly, most Americans work hard because the have to in order to survive... not because they want a fancy car.  Do you think that everyone who goes without vacation is driving around in a Cadillac?  Take a random poll on the Loop Bus of when everyone's last 2 week, or even 1 week August vacation was and I can assure you it was sometime around never.

You know what, America is a great country... We're still the land of opportunity where someone can work hard and become successful.  But other countries may have figured something out about success that we haven't.  Success is useless if we never have time to enjoy it.  Sure, you can live in a mansion with a giant pool, have a huge living room where your 2.5 kids have every gadget in the world to play with and you can drive the greatest electric car money can buy... but it's all meaningless if we don't have time to enjoy it.  If we keep looking at any time away from work as some sort of communist activity, we're really going to miss out on what's really important in life: LIFE.