Starbucks’ festive cups have seen their fair share of controversy but this season Twitter turned its attention to McDonald’s.
The fast food giant became the latest company to cause uproar after releasing their version of the red Christmas cup for their McCafe. The cup reads “Warmest Greetings” over two white mittens, gold stars and snowflakes.
However, Twitter user Sam Sykes had some fun with the design by pointing out that with some slight modifications McDonald's holiday cups appear to show hands exposing a person's backside.
Other users were quick to react to it.
One tweeted: “That is an extremely unfortunate design. Don’t any companies keep a 12-year-old on hand for this?"
Another one said: “When someone draws fingers on McDonald's mittens and 'spreading holiday cheer' takes on entirely new meaning. Good God.”
The altered cup came to the internet’s attention after it was shared on Reddit, but it was actually uploaded to the REBRN website before that, according to Buzzfeed.
As of Tuesday morning, the new design had been retweeted more than 14,000 times and liked nearly 23,000 times,
Of course, McDonald’s was quick to reply that the original version, released earlier this month, had nothing to do with human anatomy.
“To be clear, our festive McCafé cups are of mittens not hands,” a spokesperson for McDonald’s told Business Insider.
“The altered image circulating on social media is the result of someone getting a little cheeky and adding some hand-drawing to a cup.”
In November, coffee drinkers have slammed Starbucks for "politicising coffee" with the chain's new green "community cups".
Created by artist Shogo Ota, the artwork on the green cups was meant to symbolise shared human connection.
Starbucks later explained the green cup has not actually been launched for Christmas.
Howard Schultz, chairman and chief executive of Starbucks, said: "During a divisive time in our country, Starbucks wanted to create a symbol of unity as a reminder of our shared values, and the need to be good to each other."
