My anger management has been going well, thank you very much. Even christmas music doesn’t rile me. Only one thing of late has disturbed my legendary seasonal bonhomie and general goodwill-to-all-bastards demeanour.
And that is obviously-hyperbolic advertising. We all understand the tropes of advertising so, of course, tell me that what you’re peddling is better than your competitors’ offerings while it’s actually identical; naturally, I understand that your product is consumed by pants-moisteningly attractive people and that, if I use it too, I will be considered to be attractive. That’s all fair enough.
No, I’m talking about the ludicrously unrelated association of mundane products with high concepts: imagine if toilet paper were marketed as preserving democracy, that kind of thing.
Exhibit one, the televisual rectal cyst that roused me from my semi-pissed slumber last night to begin foaming at the mouth, is the £3m ‘freedom’ ad campaign for LG (watch it if you really need to).
Cue a film of a small baby swimming in water (all very Nevermind); “the day we are born is the last day we are truly free” intones SeriousVoiceoverMan. “Before you know it, we’re boxed in; held back; constrained” he continues over images of cubicle farms, ranks of desks. Tantalisingly he asks “What if we knew we were free to go further?” over sunny visuals of flowers opening, wide open vistas, and a gratuitous pretty women in a bikini being hosed down.
So, that’s the set-up. We can see by this point that whatever it is they want you to buy is inextricably linked with the concept of “freedom”. Never mind that the ad agency’s idea of freedom is being submerged insensible in warm amniotic fluid and strapped immobile to a placenta (all very The Matrix with a dash of Oedipus complex: rather sinister, if you think about it).
In Adland, freedom usually means cars or tampons. Tampons because, as Mrs Pankhurst would have told you, women never feel truly free unless they’re swimming or wearing white trousers while simultaneously menstruating and risking toxic shock syndrome. The way to advertise cars is to remind us of the single USP of the car (you can go where you want whenever you want) that is shared by every motor vehicle, while insinuating that flooring the accelerator of the Audi Mingé is the act of an eco-warrior that does the planet a favour.
Back to the product. Tampon or Motor? Neither. Our advert is for an LG television. Now, I have nothing against televisions. I was recently persuaded by my family to purchase one the size of Luxembourg and I spend many an hour balefully peering at it. During those periods of stupefaction, I have concluded that TV has three primary purposes:
It’s the best way to find out who the government requires us to hate at the moment.
When used in conjunction with a games console, it’s invaluable for stimulating endorphins and adrenaline in your children without them having to go anywhere. This negates the risk of their being touched up by one or all of the 4.9 million rampant paedophiles who are roaming YOUR TOWN right now. It also means they never need move, accumulating body mass until they die aged 50 of diabetes and obesity thereby saving the nation a fortune in medical care.
It’s perfect for married couples to avoid speaking to each other. Instead, they can watch Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks pretending to be in love, just like they thought they were before transient sexual attraction cooled to become festering resentment and then crusted into mutual contempt.
I’m a coward. I wouldn’t have opposed fascism, put a flower down the barrel of a soldier’s gun and certainly wouldn’t have mustered up the courage to stand in front of a Tienanmen tank. But even a happy Epsilon minus like me understands that a big TV does not equate to the concept of liberty.
In fact, the ad is like Orwell for lazy people. Freedom isn’t slavery in this hyperbolic hyperbollocks, but Freedom is passivity. Be free! Be free to absorb more advertising like this! The obsequious marketing media reports (seemingly without irony) some lovely doublethink from George Mead, the LG brand manager who says
the TV, print and online campaign aims to promote LG Electronics as ‘refreshing and sophisticated’ … Mead said LG was trying to ‘dumb down its marketing’ to make it simple and educate consumers.
In other words: advertising people are clever. Consumers are stupid. TV=freedom.
I tried the UK citizenship test and failed, even though I’m am a history buff and a lifelong UK citizen. In my defence, the questions are crap. How do I know when women got the right to divorce, or whether “Methodist” means Church of England?
I propose these as some better questions:
Which avuncular sports presenter was later found to be consorting with prostitutes and snorting coke? Gary Lineker/ Dickie Davis/ Frank Bough/ Jimmy Hill?
Do chips come with gravy in Ireland/ North England/ London/ Isle of Man?
Fill in the blank: Monty Python’s [blank] [blank]
At a pantomime, what is the correct response to a character saying “Oh yes it is”?
Which is NOT a genuine Enid Blyton group of fictional child detectives? Famous Five/ Five Findouters/ Six Sleuths/ Secret Seven
How long is drinking-up time?
Which of these was NOT a Blue Peter presenter? Konnie Huq/ Sophie Ellis Bextor/ John Noakes/ Peter Purves
When did England last win the World Cup?
Which of these was never a member of the Beatles? Paul McCartney/ Pete Best/ George Best/ Stu Sutcliffe
“Neeps and tatties” means what in Scotland? Turnip and potato/ coats and hats/ neat and tidy/ Did you call my pint a pouff?
Which series is set in Wetherfield/ Albert Square/ Ambridge?
Which is welsh: Thomas the Tank Engine/ Ivor the Engine?
Which comedian had “short fat hairy legs”? Bobby Ball/ Syd Little/ Ernie Wise/ Bernard Manning
Got any to add?
(On a serious note: I’m bloody glad my lovely missus got her citizenship before this silly test came out.)
Racism has always been an undercurrent to British life, from the anti-semitism that George Orwell reported, and the huge support that the Nazis enjoyed amongst the British aristrocracy, to the man who called my children “mongrels” when we were out on the street (my kids are mixed race). Most of colonial history was based on the presumption that black Africans or brown Indians couldn’t possibly govern themselves without the civilising control of the white Englishman.
And, while we have the occasional race riot, we haven’t had any pogroms or systematised kirstallnachts but that’s not because we British are any less racist than any one else, it’s just that we have a long tradition of hating each other quietly.
But I have no wish to get the BNP morons silenced on Twitter, or their broadcasts banned from the BBC. Quite the opposite. I think making these people unite together as an oppressed minority encourages them. Let them speak out, and freely. They’ll soon reveal themselves to be one-issue thugs and will be returned back to their former lives by the majority of decent people as soon as the country gets over its entirely understandable wish to give a kicking to the mainstream parties who, it appears, have been robbing us blind for years.
Even I will admit that Mr Obama might have more pressing things on his agenda than open web standards once Mr Bush is pretzeled with extreme prejudice later today.
The Obama Administration has a comprehensive agenda to empower individuals with disabilities in order to equalize opportunities for all Americans…
This commitment to accessibility for all begins with this site and our efforts to ensure all functionality and all content is accessible to all Americans.
But he’s not prez yet. Let’s hope for some technological openness once the troops are out of Iraq, Guantanamo Bay is shut, all yankees have health care and Messrs Bush, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz are in the same prison as Tony Blair.
I don’t know whether it’s because of talking to Dutch people in The Netherlands, recently reading Richard Dawkins, or the preposterous accusations of institutional racism against my previous employer, but I’ve been thinking a lot about “Equality and Diversity” recently.
It could be because when got a taxi to the airport, my taxi driver told me that he felt so sick and sleepy because of the Ramadan fast that he was worried that he would crash.
That got me thinking. Would it be “religious discrimination” if I refused to travel with a fasting driver? There’s no way that I’d get into a vehicle with a drunk driver, or one who was driving dangerously because he was talking on his mobile all the time. A legal difference is that it’s possible to verify blood/alcohol levels, where as it’s not possible to do a test for “weak and hungry”. But I see no moral difference: all are choosing to do something that potentially endangers me.
Discriminating against someone because of their religion, like disability, race or sexual discrimination, is a no-no in today’s Equality and Diversity industry. But why? It’s obviously unfair to discriminate against things that people can’t control, like the colour of their skin, disabilities or sexuality. But religion is a lifestyle choice. No-one is born into a religion and (in the free West) a particular religion is forced on no-one. And if someone chooses a certain lifestyle, why should that be legally protected? Certainly, one’s right to choose is a legal right that I absolutely uphold—but why should the results of that choice have any legal or moral privilege?
Being gay, or female, or of a certain ethnicity has no bearing on your ability to do a job. Being disabled may, but employers have a duty to make reasonable adjustments because people don’t choose to be disabled. However, some people’s ability to do their jobs can be compromised by their religious choices. My wife was refused a morning-after pill by a doctor whose religion forbade family planning. Why should that doctor be allowed to foist her religious views onto a patient—a patient whose taxes pay her salary?
In fact, why should anyone’s religious beliefs be respected? If you are a jew who will not shake hands with a woman because she might be menstruating and therefore “unclean” believes that a menstruating woman is “unclean”, why should it be discriminatory if I decided not to employ you if you display such misogyny to female colleagues or customers?
If you are a hindu who believes christians and muslims should be killed, or a christian who thinks it’s legitimate to murder abortion workers, why shouldn’t I openly treat your views with contempt?
The American National Federation for the Blind brought a class action lawsuit against target.com for inaccessibility of its website (which is, interestingly, “powered by Amazon.com”).
After lots of to-and-fro, news came today that Target have settled, paying $6million into a fund from which those affected by its inaccessiiblity (blind people in California) can claim.
Presumably (I am not a lawyer, but am I gorgeous) this sets a precedent in the USA that many businesses will find unwelcome, but which will presumably lead to more accessible websites.
So why only two cheers?
Well, $6million is lots of money, but given that Target gives away $3million every week “to its local communities through grants and special programs”, it isn’t such a great investment by Target. The terms of the settlement also means that the only people being catered for by this settlement are blind screenreader users:
NFB will run an automated monitoring tool called Worldspace on Target.com every quarter…
Target shall ensure that the Target.com website meets the Target Online Assistive Technology Guidelines, attached as Exhibit C [not on website], and that blind guests using screen-reader software may acquire the same information and engage in the same transactions as are available to sighted guests with substantially equivalent ease of use.
Upon completion of the changes to Target.com pursuant to Section 6.2 herein, the NFB shall certify the Target.com website through its NFB Nonvisual Accessibility Certification program using the standard techniques and criteria of that program.
NFB will annually report to Target the results of user testing by 5 to 15 blind persons with varying skill levels and using JAWS…
Target shall ensure that complaints received from guests regarding the accessibility of Target.com by those using screen-reader technology are reported to a Target employee responsible for ensuring that Target.com is accessible.
Target shall provide to the NFB a quarterly summary of any complaints received from guests regarding the accessibility or usability of Target.com by those using screen-reader technology…
NFB Nonvisual Accessibility Certification. Upon completion of the changes to Target.com pursuant to Section 6.2 herein, the NFB shall certify the Target.com website through its NFB Nonvisual Accessibility Certification program using the standard techniques and criteria of that program.
Working with members of the technology community, the National Federation of the Blind has developed a rigorous procedure by which Web sites and applications that have made special efforts to be accessible to the blind can be identified and recognized.
Accessibility is more than just blind people who use screenreaders. It’s a pity (but it’s understandable) that the NFB didn’t think of other groups with accessibility problems and require development to standards laid down in the internationally-recognised, open WCAG guidelines rather than their own proprietary process.
The danger is that corporations and developers will start developing for the assistive technologies and monitoring tools (machines) rather than people, and that would be a very retrograde step.
Although I lived in East Asia for four years, I never visited China. Although I’d love to see it, my conscience won’t allow me to give a penny to its corrupt and immoral leadership, particularly after my experience with Tibetan refugees in India.
So I find myself in the slightly odd position of agreeing wholeheartedly with President Bush (!) when he said yesterday,
The United States believes the people of China deserve the fundamental liberty that is the natural right of all human beings. So America stands in firm opposition to China’s detention of political dissidents and human rights advocates and religious activists…
Ultimately, only China can decide what course it will follow. America and our partners are realistic, and we’re prepared for any possibility. I’m optimistic about China’s future. Young people who grow up with the freedom to trade goods will ultimately demand the freedom to trade ideas, especially on an unrestricted Internet. Change in China will arrive on its own terms and in keeping with its own history and its own traditions. Yet change will arrive. And it will be clear for all to see that those who aspire to speak their conscience and worship their God are no threat to the future of China.
As a member of Amnesty International, I entirely support this view, and applaud his speaking out.
In entirely unrelated news, another superpower has finally tried someone whom it imprisoned for five years with no habeas corpus. The jury disregarded the ruling regime’s request for a 30 year prison sentence, instead choosing to imprison him until early next year. The judge said, “I hope the day comes when you return to your wife and your daughters and your country.”
…from both me and my teddy bear, Shiva Anubis Jesus Zeus Mohammed Buddha Yahweh Jupiter Dalai Lama Odin Jah Wicca Flying Spaghetti Monster (pictured left).
The Sudan is fortunate to have very hard-working clerics. You’d think they would have enough to do, protesting against female circumcision and the Sudanese government’s Darfur genocide. But, valiantly, they’ve recently stayed up really late in order to concentrate on the top-priority stuff—the case of a British primary school teacher jailed for allowing her class of seven year olds to name the class teddy bear “Mohammed”.
When I am an eccentric billionaire philanthropist I shall add Khartoum to my list (which already includes Tehran, Jerusalem, Mumbai and the American mid-west) of places that need me to fund urgent humanitarian airdrops of Richard Dawkins‘ books.
It may not be the most polished-lookling blog, but it’s from heart and it took a lot of courage to write: my friend “Cynj” is the mother of a three year-old girl, and lives next to an alleged paedophile.
She’s found her daughter missing from her garden, to discover her on the neighbour’s bed. She been for a drink with him and “woke in the morning with livid scratches on my inner thighs, bruises up my back and a large lump on the back of my head”. The police have told her that he likes “to masturbate in front of small children and whilst watching them play”. He’s living below her because he was rehoused for his own protection, yet she can’t get rehoused herself.
…from both me and my teddy bear, Shiva Anubis Jesus Zeus Mohammed Buddha Yahweh Jupiter Dalai Lama Odin Jah Wicca Flying Spaghetti Monster (pictured left).