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giant pitchers of sugar water, small men of dough
walking to the subway yesterday, I saw a wall of wheat-pasted posters designed to look like boxing posters, but showing competing ad icons ("Kool-Aid Man VS Pillsbury Dough Boy", "AFLAC duck VS. Merrill-Lynch Bull"). the posters are for september's "advertising week" here in new york. a line at the bottom of the posters urges you to go vote for your favorite.
and all of a sudden I got really mad, because I was expected to care. no, not even expected; it was assumed. for over fifty years madison avenue has been trying to forge pathways in our brains between the image of a small man made out of dough and pillsbury products, and they have been successful. fine, that's advertising. but what is worse is that they have been making sure we have an emotional reaction as well. it is not enough that we recognize the small dough man and start salivating for crescent rolls. we must be made to feel something for that dough man; nostalgia, familiarity, comfort. we must feel such a connection to a fictional, anthropomorphic character that we would a) take the time to vote on our favorite and b) care. at all. and the worst part of it all is that madison avenue's assumption is, generally, right on the money.
we bond with each other over shared experiences, and today that means movies and television shows and ads and celebrities. these things become our life and our conversation fills with movie quotes and remembrances of what we watched on cable when we were eleven. but it's a sham. it is a passive experience in which we sit and watch and don't interact at all, not with the people or the stories we see, not even with each other, except in sharing a memory and nodding in agreement. in the most important way, these people and worlds don't exist; they are not physical, you cannot interact with them. there is no small man made of dough bringing piping hot biscuits to your dinner table, no matter how many times you've seen his belly poked on t.v.
anyway, you can also vote for your favorite ad slogan. will you go with the pseudo-feminist pose of Virginia Slims or the nation-destabilizing, bloody-war-inducing come on of DeBeers? choose now!
and speaking of voting... I don't like to repost links to news stories, but this one was just too fascinating and appalling and a big deal. from Austin Mike and Slate yesterday: Hoodwinked: Why Is Florida's Voting System So Corrupt?