The RFT polls offer the little guy a chance to get some play and compete with giant corporations that spend millions of dollars on aggressive marketing. No one needs to pick up a copy of the RFT to discover McDonald's. McDonald's stores are not so much restaurants as they are distribution centers for chemically-engineered food products . Yet lots of people are apparently buying these corporate slogans and loyally casting their votes accordingly. A restaurant poll may seem like a rather insignificant thing to get bent out of shape about given all the other deserving targets of ire , but the RFT survey is emblematic of a larger civic identity crisis.
Food is an important part of how most communities define themselves.
A visitor who picked up a copy of the RFT could understandably conclude that St. Louisans are a bunch of conservative conformists, content to wrap themselves in a cocoon of the familiar because they're too afraid to try something new. A meal from one of the embarrassingly prosaic chains featured in the RFT poll may not be particularly good, but hey, at least you know what to expect. Of course, such a thumbnail psychological sketch of the average St. Louisan is not entirely fair. The fast-food mindset and the values it embodies are hardly unique to St. Louis. It's now possible for an American to live his entire life without ever patronizing an independent, owner-operated business.