I’m not opposed to doling out “Congratulations” to the vast minions as it is warranted. In fact, I like to consider myself a liberal congratugiver, if you will. Over the years, my worldly experience has also lent itself to being the recipient of said “congratulations” on, I’m proud to say, more than one occasion. Three, actually.
However, the use of the word congratulations has become hopefully muddled. I blame the Communists honestly – and if you would like to send me a separate message I’ll be happy to go into my litany of explaining the reasons why. My focus in this blog is on one main misuse of the word. To make things easier, I’ll make like Ikea and put a simple table together for quick reference:
As you can plainly see, what concerns me most about modern society is NOT the normal day to day congratulations that are thrown around willy-nilly. No, what bugs me is when I buy a stupid product, open up the instruction manual, and am met with a smarmy:
“Congratulations on your purchase of the finest remote-controlled vacuum cleaner filter bag in the world!”
I already BOUGHT the product and paid for it with my hard-earned money. Don’t congratulate me for spending MY money on YOUR product. If anything, I should be congratulating YOU for sucking me in with your fancy packaging and gripping marketing materials. I have no need for your patronizing attempt at making me feel better for spending my money on YOU.
Here are some other examples of this:
A simple ‘thank you’ would suffice from now on please.
Flying Here in the Middle of Somewhere... 
Congratulations on being the peevey-est blogger ever!!
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Yay! My first award!
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I feel it’s self-righteous when the company/product congratulates me for buy their product. They are, in fact, patting themselves on their back for logging another sale. That’s what it should say, “Congratulations Sanyo for selling another schlep a dual cassette boom box. Well done!”
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“…and if you also suckered the patsy into a 3-year maintenance contract, you da man, Sanyo!”
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Exactly. My money should be enough congratulations for them.
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Ha, I’ve not thought about this. Now I’ll be scouring the directions of everything I buy. Perhaps when we open a cereal box, they could put ‘congratulation’ on the bag. The possibilities are endless!
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When I find that first bag of cereal with a congratulatory message on it, and I will, you’ll be the first to know.
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Oh, it *must* be out there. “Congratulations on purchasing Fiber-n-Chocolate Flakes! A wise step in adding both fun and good health to your diet.”
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Ah Tim, like minds… I can’t stand those smarmy statements either. LOVE the chart! I shall clip it for handy guidance. Congratulations my foot. Do they really think we are so spineless and insecure that we need phoney sycophantic strokes? And yes: “Thank you for your business. We stand by our product and should you have any problems do not hesitate to contact us. We will pay for its return shipping and repair, replace it promptly, or refund your purchase price, whichever you prefer. And send you free movie tickets for your trouble. And popcorn vouchers. Because that just makes the theater-going experience better and you shouldn’t be out of pocket for any concessions.”
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Wow. Smarmy, spineless and sycophantic all in one paragraph. I may be in love.
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Awww. Congratulations!
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And thank YOU for your purchase.
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