I was pondering the political messages that I am now
receiving - many of them making amazing claims - some I fear are not attainable - many of them seem to be designed to manipulate
my thinking...
It got me thinking about how ads are created to guide our behaviors, opinions, and beliefs. Some manipulations are helpful - Signs are like ads -sign
posts have messages meant to direct our actions more effectively... Judy
and I were hiking a trail in southern Peru and we realized that there were no
signs to tell us if we were on the right path or how far we had to go. Signs
are important and an expected part of our lives. But not all times in history and not all
cultures recognized signs. If you wanted
to know something we had to ask a local farmer with knowledge of the area.
Sighs of
another sort have long be seen and interpreted by seers who were able to read
the signs in tossed dry chicken bones or signs in the sky or the occurrence of earthquakes,
or from breathing too man y volcanic fumes - Many of these so called signs were
based on a misguided understanding of cause and effect... If I see an owl in the daytime, it means
something... If I see a black cat crossing my path it means something... Many traditional religions include the
reading of signs in this way.
In our day and age, we live with all kinds of signs... In
bilingual communities may include two or more languages or may be signs with only pictograms - School
crossing, restrooms: male, female, bigender, cattle crossing, right turn, windy
road... Some depend on symbols: Red=stop, Green = go, claxon = evacuate, computer
beeps and chimes... Many of our signs
assume that everyone can read English: Stop, Construction - right lane
closed... Traffic signs can be essential
for safety.
The use of messages written on a wall expanded in the late
19th century... "Bertha's cafe - breakfast all day", "Use Sloan's Liniment for pain
relief", "Curb your dog.".. But it was in the early 20th century that the concept
of signs became an industry - The concepts of Madison Avenue - the concepts of
encouraging consumption of certain products through wide spread engineering of
needs and wants...
The famous Burma Shave adds were an early example: a series of signs along a roadway, spaced at intervals, would each have a portion of the message with the "punch line" something about the shaving cream. People loves them and often passed them on like valued jokes: Examples:
The famous Burma Shave adds were an early example: a series of signs along a roadway, spaced at intervals, would each have a portion of the message with the "punch line" something about the shaving cream. People loves them and often passed them on like valued jokes: Examples:
•
Hardly a driver / Is now alive / Who passed / On hills
/ At 75 / Burma-Shave
•
Past / Schoolhouses / Take it slow / Let the little /
Shavers grow / Burma-Shave
•
If you dislike / Big traffic fines / Slow down / Till
you / Can read these signs / Burma-Shave
But the industry expanded to include clever radio and newspaper
ads... and it works! If I have a new
product and want to increase my profits - it’s all about well-designed ad
campaigns to create a need or desire for the product.True is you are selling spaghetti sauce, a church, travel to Tahiti, or tooth paste ...
A kind of co-evolution began to develop among consumers - a
growing resistance to be 'taken in' by the ads - Do you sometimes tune out
certain annoying ads...? But never mind the ads have just gotten glitzier,
cuter, sexier, louder... and they keep drawing us in with subliminal messages
that we don’t even know we have received...
We just have to resolve to be even smarter and more resistant - but they will come
right back at us...
A different kind of sign has shown up - mostly in the last
few decades... I saw pay first pencil written
graffiti on the inside of public places when I was a kid... Modern graffiti is
largely dependent on the development of the spray can of paint. Most graffiti emphasize stylized script -
some is recognizable as a single word... What is the message behind it all...
The message is "I was here, I matter, whether you like it or not I am leaving my
personal mark on the world. If I don’t
do this, I will remain invisible."
So this brings me back to our politician friends: They tell us "I am running for office because I want to win. I need to have ads directed at my audience -
I want them to know that I will meet their needs - I care about them - I will
get rid of things that they do not like - I will make policies good for their
freedoms, their resources, their beliefs..." The sad thing is their message is
often more about trying to manipulate me and not much about how much they actually
will be able to deliver... The really sad thing is that ads have come to take the place of the hard work of analyzing issues . There is no other way to vote intelligently but by careful study of the Candidates past achievements. What they have said and done are critically important - We have to discover who they associated with. Democracy is hard work... We can either be suckered in by Madison Avenue
type political ads - or we can each do the hard work of understanding issues.
Good luck!
A friendly home made sign in a farmers yard...
