Living in a McDonalized World

Living in a McDonalized World

Every morning before class or work I make a quick stop at McDonalds, I always pull in the drive thru and order a caramel mocha. I love coffee but I don’t like to wake up ten minutes earlier to make myself one, I rather go to McDonalds where I can easily go around the restaurant, order my coffee, pay for it at the first window, drive forward, get my coffee and I matter of minutes I’m back to my daily routine. After reading the McDonalization of Society by George Ritzer I learned that the process employed to have my coffee ready in instants was called McDonalization. McDonalization is “the process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as of the rest of the world” (1). In this paper I will talk about the five components of McDonalization and how this model has influenced and shaped my life.

One of the components of McDonalization is Efficiency, which basically is achieving a certain goal at a rapid speed while using the minimum amount of cost and effort. This is portrayed as beneficial for the costumer, but it is at the best interest of the business. An example would be me using the drive thru at McDonalds it benefits me because I get the service faster, but it helps the industry more because they will not have to deal with me going into the restaurant and getting their floors dirty, refilling my drink, taking extra ketchup, and I would also be taking the my trash with me as well. This means that they will have to employ less staff to clean the inside of the restaurant; they will spend less money in trash bags and will eventually make more money. I embrace the McDonalization of my life sometimes because I walk less and get things done quicker. I also like to get the most out of my money. And that is when the next component comes into place.

Next to my list comes calculability, which is “…calculating, counting, quantifying many different things. Quantity tends to become a surrogate for quality” (72). This means that the focus is on the number and size of the product being produced rather than the quality of the product. An example also found in McDonalds is the 20 piece McNuggets for only five dollars, they offer a large quantity of food, but we do not know if it is the best quality. I don’t know if the meat that I consume is the best there is, nonetheless the food tastes the same everywhere I go. When I go to McDonalds even if it is not the one on the north side of town I always expect the same taste on my food or coffee. This is called predictability, and it is the effort to structure our surroundings so that people know what to expect. Another example can be when we go to Meijer’s; they have the same set up or a similar set up so that we know where to find what we are looking for faster. And when we reach the checkout register we encounter the fourth dimension of McDonalization which is intensified control of humans through the usage of nonhuman technology (102). I’m talking about the self-scan checkout at the stores, we are not worried about a mistake because we have the machines that do the math for us, we just need to scan the item and the computer will do the rest.

My story is simple, I moved to the United States when I was about to turn ten years old. I lived in a small town in Mexico, where small local restaurants take their time to get to know the customers, and make sure they are satisfied with the service, they might not be the fastest, but when I ask them to make something special for me that is not on the menu they will gladly do it. The town I lived in my childhood has been away from McDonalized industries, I loved that way of living. Time seemed to run more slowly and things would be less generalized. Now that I moved that I live in the United States, things seem to run a little faster than when I lived in Mexico. Efficiency has become a key component in