The absurd plethora of advertising

Published on March 12, 2004 By Angloesque In Business

I watch the Today show from time to time, and it struck me this morning how commercialized every part of our lives are becoming. When you watch an NBA basketball game, what do you see on the backboard frame of the hoop? "NBA.com" What is our weather brought to us by? The local Dodge dealer. Who's telling us about the birthdays today? Smuckers. Think that magazine in the seat pocket is for your entertainment while you're on the plane? Nope, it's making money for the airline. Even ski slopes have them on the chair lifts or the support poles and on the back of sticky tickets. Last night the winning team of candidates on "The Apprentice" won by advertising on those little buggy things. Is there not enough advertising already? The sides of trains, buses, and even taxis are filled, not to mention name-brand clothing; everything we read, everywhere we go, we can't get away from it. Advertisers and entreprenurials, it seems, are not content with the regular mediums: televisoin, radio, newspaper; they're always striving to pull ahead in their cutthroat business and come up with a New And Improved! idea or place.

Well, bully for them, but I'm sick of getting inundated with advertisements everywhere I go. I was hiking last summer and found slips for someone's web page tacked to trail signs. How low can you go?

On the other hand, we've got a flailing economy that needs all the support it can get. I just wish that support could come in a form different from the constant barage of ads in places we don't need them. I'd like to have a place to get away from them, or be able to watch a basketball game (the game, mind you, not counting the commercials) without feeling like a somewhat captive audience. I'm going to have to start bushwhacking just to get away from it in the great ol' outdoors.

Comments

messybuu

on Mar 13, 2004

You want to know the worst part? My mother received an envelope the other week with a sticky note attached to the advertisement that looked as though it were sent by a friend, but eventually we figured out that it wasn't. So now real advertisers are using what spammers use. I say it's time to start the killing.

psychx

on Mar 13, 2004

Theres a gift shop in the Vatican which I couldn't believe. It has no actual advertising for it but if they can make one of the supposedly most sacred places on earth commercial they can fill our lives with ads.

PoetPhilosopher

on Mar 13, 2004

Heheh. Some might consider any evangelical activity of the church "advertising"

This post, and your last have a consistency which I like, but it seems you are fighting against the stream here. We live in a cold capitalistic world (God Bless Us). Money Makes the World Go Round.

Locamama

on Mar 14, 2004

Do you remember the first time you saw an advertisement on the inside of a bathroom stall door? That was definately someone thinking - hey who cares if susie loves joe - we have a captive audience here - lol! You are right. I think they could start actually printing ads on the toilet paper itself. The back of grocery receipts have advertisements and coupons, before the movie starts we see local stores and car dealers advertisements, inside our fortune cookies advertisements. I would say they have saturated the market but I'm sure we'll notice somewhere new that their wasn't an advertsisement. They will probably start paying people to get their forehead tattooed with a logo. Maybe that would be a good way to advertise plastic surgery - a nice tattoo - do you like these boobies - you could have them too - just call Plastic Surgery is Us at 1-800-BIGBOOB - lol! I am laughing because its so absurd but there just seems to be no stop.

Angloesque

on Mar 14, 2004

Psychx, that's interesting for two reasons: (1) that according to the Bible, Jesus cleansed the temple of such riffraff when he was around, and (2) because Chaucer's Canterbury Tales tell about selling sacraments and whatnot to those poor folks on their pilgrimmages; church is certainly not immune to commercialism, and they've made a killing on it in the past.

Poet, I'll *always* fight against the current (unless I like it--my J.Crew jeans are pretty comfy). I used to have this roommate who always talked about "sheep" and I suppose it made me more aware of what I like and dislike about the world in general, so I sort of resolved to not be a sheep. ("Voldemort for President!") Not that being a goat is much more useful, but I like it.

Locamama, I posted a long time ago about wisdom I learned in bathroom stalls, but it was dumb so I removed it. Anyway, you could seriously write a book about some of the stuff written there. And in a lot of girls college dorms, they already have ads.... I'm telling you, there isn't a place on Earth a human can go and get peace.

And so,

Peace.

-T.

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