Submission, Emasculation, Pathos: Being a Man in a Superbowl Ad

Last night, the USofA watched the Saints march in right over the Colts. It was a great game. Well played, some bold surprises and some genuinely tender moments. Had I been alone, I might have wept openly at Drew Brees (NFL MVP) clutching his son just after the big win. Brees is a charismatic and gentle presence on screen, and I was caught off guard at how genuine the moment was. He knew he was on camera, but it never felt inauthentic. Just a guy holding onto his baby boy at the proudest moment in his life. Jesus, Breesus. It was like getting shot with a Super Soaker loaded with Mom's Apple Pie and Unjaded Democracy.

The subplot to the Superbowl proceedings is, of course, the Commercials. Every year at this time, marketers sink millions of dollars into launching an ad campaign that will etch their brands into the American psyche for all time - at least until someone adds Bacon or Chipotle to the recipe.

For the most part, the spots were funny and well produced. We had our share of some real boner moves, thanks to Taco Bell (Rap is Dead.) and Go Daddy (Hey! Remember we were cool once! Right? Retread! Retread!) and a shocking overuse of the "Dramatic Hamster Meme". Honestly, fellas...where have you been? That thing came out in 2007 - which is like three decades ago in internet years.

And then there are ads like this one:



LAZY. LAZY. LAZY.

This falls into the category of "Beer is Better than a Woman". Granted, there is no beer in this ad, but the category reflects a broader attitude in advertising that makes me queasy: "A woman steals your manhood, and all that is left is a puddle of barely recognizable human jelly. How can you unblock the cock? BUY THIS THING."

What's worse is that it relies on the concept that all chicks can think about is shopping, candles and underwear and what we want is an emasculated BFF to tote our shit around while we giggle up the escalator like a third grade pageant doll.

If you need a portable TV to grow your dick back and preserve your sanity, you might want to rethink this relationship altogether.

AND..."Change out of that skirt, Jason." Here's another chapper - you can call a man anything, ANYTHING AT ALL, but a Woman. Suggest that he wears a skirt or behaves like a female and you have successfully infected the poor turd with social leprosy.

Then we come to this:



Watch out womens. In post-apocalyptica, you are not worth a set of tires, and are swiftly traded to some Mad Max bandits who - guess what! - don't want you anyway (thanks to a misunderstanding provided by the old Catskills joke). Not even in your skin tight pleather body stocking.

Once discarded, what will become of her? Idaknow. Least she's not weighing down the tires anymore.

and finally, there's this one:



1. I actually kinda like this ad. The writing is smart and funny. It takes the old tropes about work and relationships, and re-imagines them into a tyranny of paltry indignities. The images of a the men are arresting.

However...

2. Does it really suck that much for guys, being married or in a relationship? Is it really so awful it causes you to go wall-eye and retreat into a fantasia of Cars, Beer and Pizza? Do you sacrifice your very will, soul and personality for this?

Apparently.

That sucks, yo.

I hate to tell you, though, no amount of automotivesexboxbudlight therapy is going to fill that ugly void you have inside you.


There appears to be a lot of tension with marketers about where to position ads aimed at men these days. With the definition of masculinity in a more liquid state, we get railroaded with images of pathetic, dopey guys, paralyzed by uncertainty and an unwillingness to evolve. This short changes everybody.

I don't want to be portrayed as a woman who only wants shoes/yogurt/cleaning supplies and finds her mate an impediment to her very femininity.

There is drudgery, frustration, sacrifice and compromise in the workplace and at home (for both genders). There ain't nothing wrong with tapping that font of comedic oil. But I don't think it's worth perpetuating the idea that relationships are starter graveyards to push a few units of beer.

The Aliens are Back

Many moons ago, I posted a segment about the extraterrestrial world of the Disaronno Advertisement. These spots showed us a reality that had been downloaded into the invading species, pieced together from James Spader movies and Parker Brothers board game commercials. This is what the aliens think we look like when we party.

Several months after this post, I discovered a whole new series of commercials:



I don't think we are the intended audience for these commercials. What we have here is a training video for Alien Bartending School. They know that eventually the humans are going to want something more complicated than just Disaronno. Orion forbid they blow their cover by not having a backup! So they concoct some quick and easy recipes using the bedrock of their cocktail knowledge: Disaronno on the Rocks.

However, I'm sure there were a lot of hands going up once the concept of "Milk" was introduced.

Then, there's the Cranberry lesson.



"Excuse me? What is the green circle that slices into the glass receptacle at the end? He didn't say anything about a GREEN CIRCLE."

And lastly:



There was much mumbling in the classroom. Where's the pitcher for the lemon? Why did they squeeze that ball of yellow? Couldn't they have done the same for the red of the cranberry and the white of the cattle juice?

(One small alien weeps in the back, still disturbed by the "Origins of Milk".)


I like to think that we have received these transmissions by mistake and a baffled school room of Alien bartenders is watching this:



Our planet is saved.

I am alone.

So, I've seen this a couple of times in Starbucks:

The sticker's largest words are Insulated and Isolation. Taken on their own, I don't suppose there is anything worth cocking a brow at...but together? WITH the Starbucks logo? It looks like a deliberate joke. I am shocked that Starbucks would allow the word "Isolation" to appear on their merchandise, even if it is the French word for Insulate.

Everyone I show this to is like, "Yeah..so?"



Oh, well.

Nora Jones CDs for everyone!

Serenity Now.

Thank you, Athena.

Now someone needs to go check on the agency that created these ads. I think one of the copy writers is letting his stoner girlfriend write the commercials. ('Cause I swear I hear this exact speech at a party in college.)

Also, is it just me, or does Athena's face seem not to work very well? Like she's having to concentrate really hard to prevent sudden paroxysms. Every facial expression is a hair late.

Maybe she just ate a fistful of barbituates.

I'm a little alarmed that the people in ads for technological gizmos and services are so...placid.

In a busy and chaotic world, I get the desire to suppress animal frenzy. Let us all be at ease for we deserve a period of relaxation. We deserve serenity.

Right.

I'm gonna stock up on water and canned goods for when the gaskets start to blow.

How the Glittery Glove of Pop Culture Touched Me This Week.

What a strange landscape this week has been.

So, I went to see The Transformers movie.

(Sigh)

It. was. AWFUL. By now, the critics have let their opinions be known, so this is no secret.

I'm not a fool. The Transformers Movies have no pretensions to art and so my expectations are pretty low. And even then, EVEN THEN, friends, my desires were thwarted.

You know what I wanted to see?

I WANTED TO SEE SOME EMMER EFFING ROBOTS KICK THE SHIT OUT OF EACH OTHER. I WANTED TO SEE OPTIMUS PRIME TRANSFORM HIS GIANT TRUCK ASS INTO A ROBOT AND STOMP AROUND AND SAY WISE SOUNDING SHIT AND SMASH THE BALLS OFF OF MEGATRON. I WANTED CHASE SCENES.

What I got was two and half hours of my life stolen as we watched the most ridiculous "plot" and "dialogue" force its way onto the screen and call into question English as an effective form of communication. A six year old could have written it. But they didn't, because a six year old would have done a better job.

I did my share of hooting and hollering. It's like a reflex. I can't help it. But it left me exhausted - spent from the roller coaster of aching disappointment and overweening enthusiasm.

Ef you, Michael Bay.

Also this week, if you are just waking up from your Lunesta/Captain Morgan bender, Michael Jackson died.

The King of Pop has not been on my radar for many years now. Once my Thriller madness wore off, I never regained my interest. At a certain point (after jumping about 36 sharks) he cemented himself in my mind as one of the most repulsive examples of public excess. His decrepitude made me lose my appetite.

I will say though, that the monstrous being we all pointed to and laughed at seems so separate from the Michael Jackson of old. I watched a few videos on the yootoobs and that kid was a genuine talent. Is it possible for anyone of watch these old clips and not shake their heads with "Boy, what a shame"?

I remember wondering as a kid (whilst in the throes of my slavish love), what the world would be like when he died. What a desolate, hopeless hunk of rock we would inhabit. The thought twinged my heart with urgency, I may have even cried over it. Please don't die before I meet

you.

Needless to say I never met Michael Jackson. And it is a peculiar feeling to be alive on a day you imagined as a child and have it be so different than what you expected.

Finally, I was made aware of this little item on Wednesday:

W. T. Fuck.

For serious? A gigantor hamburger loaded for bear at a mouth of a woman suspiciously made up to look like a dead-eyed blow up doll?

Look. I know sex sells (I should again iterate that I have no problem with sexual practices - orthodox or un - between consenting adults.).

It would appear oral sex sells even more. Why would that be? Because, Christ knows, if you shove seven inches of beef in its mouth you certainly don't have to hear it talk.

AND THE TRANSFORMERS EFFING SUCKED.

WTP. (What the Pork.)

(Sits, tharning* at the screen.)

Food is fraught. There is no getting around it. In a First World society – where food is abundant - (even though, in a truly perverse turn, there are those in this First World who are still starving.) our nutritional intake has made its move far beyond an instrument of survival to an expression of fantasy, fetish and power. Our uneasy relationship with food in the US mirrors that of our twitchy sexual appetites as a source of shame, punishment, titillation or thrall.

This is not unique to the American Experience. Anxious murmurs are heard all through out the centuries about over-indulgence in any respect. We bathe in the battery acid of our own guilt over what we’ve eaten, when, how much, why. God. I ate that entire pizza by myself to fill the ever-widening crevasse of loneliness, didn’t I?

Every day, there it is. Food. Don’t eat it. DO eat it. Indulge yourself, you disgusting waste. We trumpet our victories in denying our taste buds that last French fry or Snickers Miniature. But lurking just around the corner is another temptation, another Food Hooker waiting to ask your hard up belly if it’s looking for a date.

And, oh, my god, it is.

This tears at us inside. I want that, no, I don’t, wait, I DO.

Ads like this DON'T HELP ANYTHING.

I have nothing against the entanglement of sex and food. To each his own, tra la, tra la.

I do, however, get the fierce heebie jeebies over a woman (?) in a pig suit - perhaps on leave from the Furry convention - aping the sexy Flashdance choreography as she (?) yanks the chain and releases BARBECUE SAUCE on her/him/itself, only to flick it in the direction of two nonplussed dudes and an ANTHROPOMORPHIZED BAG (presumably filled with Sliders or, gulp, more BBQ sandwiches), dousing them in reddish sauce and then cutting to the "Come Hither" shot of the sandwiches themselves, only to return to the dudes as one of them, in a, let's face it, suggestive maneuver, wipes a bit of the sauce off the bag and LICKS IT OFF HIS FINGER.

What club is this? Is that guy dating the bag? Would you, I ASK YOU, lick ANYthing off of ANYone - even a date - that was splashed on you by a sweaty exotic dancer? Even if you were in Amsterdam and hopped up on goofballs?

And why is the sauce "Come Hither"? So you can (that's right) Pork It?

None of this, and I mean NONE, makes me want to eat anything from this tawdry city called White Castle. Where every club features a Mascot Sauce Dance and Paper Bags with Feet are the only escorts in town. I round the corner and there are the Chicken Ring Hookers arm in arm with the Douchebag Husbands.

(This is to say nothing of the White Castle commercials that feature the little Paper Bags stalking unsuspecting humans in their places of business or at a gym. CAN'T YOU LEAVE US ALONE?)


White Castle is counting on our twisted casserole of Pop Culture Strip Club Junk Food Shame in order to sell us its wares.

"Hey, baby, how 'bout you and me get to makin' some bacon?"

We pull out the $1.13 it costs for a sandwich, knowing what dread the dawn will bring.





*Tharn - v. Stupefied, distraught, hypnotized with fear. But can also, in certain contexts, mean "looking foolish," or again "heartbroken" or "forlorn." Originally found in Richard Adams book "Watership Down".

Welcome to the future

Imagine for a second that you are watching this commercial as part of a 1984-ish Sci-Fi flick cautioning us about the dangers of technology.

The droning, uninflected lyrics (The use of words like "Elation", "Sensation" and "Shivers" with no hint of the actual feeling). The humans staring into the camera with a helpless, unaware gaze. No two humans are shown interacting.

But the digital world is so alive. So vibrant. That's where the action is, friends.

I saw this a few days ago, and was flash-chilled to the bone.

Is this a commercial Comcast or Second Life dot com?



Sure, Comcast is wont to parody itself, and I am more than happy to partake in the miracle of the internet, but this feels like a candy-coated entreaty to plug the Matrix right into my head hole.

Celebrating the Mild Disappointments of My Life

There was a time when these commercials swarmed the airwaves. Friends and couples get together for a night in, perhaps after a hard day, to reminisce over photos and relax in the gentle glow of the other's company. General Foods International Coffees makes its inevitable entrance and the dam breaks on soulful remembrances. The mere taste calls up trips to Paris and Vienna where one or both of them were transfigured by the cafes and waiters with fake names.

This is a risky business.

What if the taste calls up something totally different?

(MONICA, in her floral Jessica McClintock dress and cardigan approaches, bearing a tray full of tea cup and pot. She stirs up some Suisse Mocha from General Foods International Coffees. MARIE is looking through old photos. Everything is a little pink and soft focus.)


MARIE: These sure do bring back some memories. (Sees the tray) Ohh. What's this?

MONICA: (Offering a steaming cup of brown) Taste it.

(MONICA tastes her own cup, and with the warmth of a McDonald's heat lamp:)

MONICA: Remember that night in Mexico City?

(MARIE prepares to take a sip but something stops her as the steam wafts up her nose. Her gentle smiles transform into anxious frowns)

MARIE: Um,...no...I...

MONICA: (Oblivious) There was that cafe and the two guys from San Tropez? This tastes just like the - What's wrong with you?

MARIE: I-I Don't want any...

MONICA: Just try it.

MARIE: No.

MONICA: Take a sip.

MARIE: I can't.

MONICA: Can't you share this one thing with me? We were having such a good time...why do you have to ruin it? Now come on -

(MONICA pushes the cup up to MARIE's mouth. MARIE sips, then in one flinging motion bats the cup away)

MARIE: Stop it! Just stop.. I can't drink that..the taste, the TASTE. Suddenly, I feel all alone and, Oh My god....Do you remember prom night when I got ditched and it started to rain?

(Pause)

MONICA: Uh...Uh-huh.

MARIE: That's what this tastes like...I went into that diner and they said I couldn't wait there unless I bought something...

MONICA: Did you, uh, buy Suisse Mocha?

MARIE: Shut up! NO. I didn't. I bought a Coke. But this, THIS is what the inside of that place SMELLED LIKE. Oh, my God, in liquid form!

MONICA: I - I...

MARIE: (Trying to wipe something imaginary from off her body.) God. I feel so lonely. MAKE IT STOP. GET THIS SHIT OUT OF HERE.

(MARIE swipes the tray off the coffee table and it smashes to the ground. A beat. Both women are crying.)



This is the risk you run when peddling smell and taste as a vehicle for pleasant memory.


All this aside, the soft focus and saccharine, I still wanted my General Foods International Coffee scenario. I wanted to have traveled to Paris. I wanted to look through old photos with friends and savor precious memories. I wanted to celebrate the moments of my life.

The first time I tasted General Foods International Coffee was when my Mom purchased some over a Christmas Holiday. My sister and I laughed at the notion, but I think somewhere in both of us we wanted to replicate the scenes from TV...with a hint of irony, of course.

We boiled up some water, dumped a couple of tablespoons into our cups and sipped.

You know what this stuff tastes like? Swiss Miss.

It's all just hot chocolate with some caffeine for good measure.

There were no dreams of Swiss ski trips. No Roman Holiday fantasies. It's hot chocolate. Pure, childlike, and as American as corn shuck.

Oh, well.

It's still hot chocolate. Squirt some whipped cream on top and I'm satisfied.


And for your viewing pleasure:



These women are morons.

What has two thumbs & is trying to trade a cheap stuffed bear for a Beej?

This guy:



1. Why is that guy dressed like Kenickie?
2. I don't think he even has a girlfriend.
3. Fella, the voice in the black box isn't actually talking to YOU. Calm down.
4. Bear at office = Squealing whirlwind of single entendres.
5. Uh-oh. Is Kenickie looking at porn? oh...no, he's ordering a bear.
6. That is the worst tattoo ever.
7. Why do grown men need a bear counselor?
8. Wow, that bear counselor is wearing a lot of lip gloss.
9. That's right, buddy, do your "Goal" dance. Tonight it's a 72 second ride to Orgasmo town.
10. "I can't wait to show him MY surprise." Does anyone else think the guy might be in eminent danger?
11. Hunny. U is a nerse. I gived u bear nerse. can we do the thing now?

You can't hear me shrieking right now

But I am...



WHAT. ON. EARTH. SERIOUSLY.

Nightmare images. This is what things like this are. IT DOESN'T MAKE ME WANT TO USE H.R. BLOCK. It does, however, make me want to vanquish these cyclopes and cast them in to the deep pit of Tartarus.

AND...

May I add that if the Earth was populated by dopey one-eyed Gen-Xers, eyeglasses would NOT look like that. Where's the nose rest? Right now the guy's schnoz is squished beneath the frame. Major design flaw.



God. WHY DO THEIR EYES HAVE TO BE SO BIG?


(Shudder) Gee.

Shame on the House of Python

Fuck you, guys.

I suppose the burn is on me for being surprised at all. Eventually, EVERYTHING will be recuperated by the advertising industry. Seriously, what took these guys so LONG?

Huh, fellas? What took you so fucking long to warm up to the idea the GATORADE was worth selling out the legions of fans who can quote you chapter and verse and who have held on to your sketches as the nonpareil of counterculture comedy?

What lured you in? It must have been the razor sharp writing - right?- the self aware satire and loony non sequiturs that you yourselves have made famous. Yeah?

No. No, it wasn't because the scripts for these desperate grabs at relevance read like boardroom consensus-driven pop culture barf. Maybe, I'd be somwehat forgiving if these ads were even funny. MAY. BE.

I can only console myself that perhaps the lot of your were mainlined roofies and stuffed into the trunk of an 1988 Oldsmobile Cutless Supreme, only to awaken in a warehouse days later, dehydrated, bewildered and devastated to find you had given over power of attorney to Michael Jackson.

Who among your ranks betrayed you thus?

Et Tu, Eric Idle?



The whole of you need to be strapped down, eyes propped open a la Clockwork Orange and made to watch Brazil on repeat until your wit grows back.

Or until the Rape scene from a Clockwork Orange with Alex DeLarge's rendition of Singing in the Rain is used to sell Coors Light.

Shampoo for my real friends...

So...In the first few seconds, can anyone tell me what this is a commercial for?




Depression? Drug Addiction? Anorexia?

Nope.

Pantene.

Shampoo.

I happened upon this while I was looking for something else to be angry about.

Why spend thousands of dollars on therapy or expensive drugs, Depressed Girl? We know you are alone in your grey cluttered bathroom, staring into the mirror bemoaning how anxious you are over your bad debt, how fat you think you are, how scarred by years of abuse...TO YOUR HAIR!

Girl, one wash with Pantene and and all your troubles are rinsed away. The grey clutter of your bathroom, will give way to the slow- motion Asian influence loft where your hair will flow like the shellacked pinions of a raven.

You are happy.

You are free.

Thank you Pantene.

KFC is giving you the answer.

The other day I compared existential angst to the act of dining. The basic gist was thinking that we should just get this life over with because we're all headed to the grave anyway, is tantamount to eating food slung on a plate with no care for it's taste or presentation because "Welp, it's all gonna look the same in my stomach."

This sort of Zero Sum dining experience is available for purchase by the public. Chicken, corn, gravy, cheese, and mashed potatoes, all piled in styrofoam container and shoveled into the face pocket. It's the KFC Famous Bowl.

Patton Oswalt does a good bit about eating KFC's "Failure Pile in a Sadness Bowl". I, myself have never tasted one. Even before I heard his rant, the KFC Famous Bowl filled me with consternation, so I have avoided it.

I really don't have much of a problem with the product itself. It's the idea that consuming it, fills that open cavity deep inside where no other can touch.

(The quality on this is a little poor...)



Really? Known you forever? Is this what we are KFC? In the marketing meetings and R & D, THIS is what we've come to.

Apparently yes.

On top of it all, I'm troubled that this guy, assuming that he doesn't know about the Famous Bowl already, would venture into a KFC and expose his mild American depression by ordering off the menu.

Imagine if this were a documentary and our protagonist headed for the counter at a KFC. It is unlikely that he would order in such a charming and animated way. He's more likely to half mumble/half groan his way through it as he tugs on the tail of the stained sweatshirt he's been wearing since his girlfriend broke up with him.

And the improbably pert and interested girl behind the counter would not be there. She does not exist in nature.



What ARE these guys talking about? STDs? The tone is so tender and earnest I feel like they are going to launch into a PSA about smoking or puppy adoption.

But as the guys says, "a bowl full of the things she loves." Do you see how happy the bowl makes her? You'll only come in second fiddle, tender PSA guy. She is fulfilled all through her heart and uterus by the chunky food-ish glop in front of her.

Why look for answers in relationships with other people? You'll never find them. At least not that satisfy like a KFC Famous Bowl.

And when the bowl is over and you feel that growing sense of dread and regret, there's always another bowl.Thank you KFC, for sending me off into the weekend with a song in my heart and a skip in my step.

And the faint taste of bile in my throat.

Your Children are Disgusting

I'm a pretty clean person. I take a shower everyday, I wash my hands after I use the restroom, I don't wear underwear more than once before washing it. As such, I don't worry myself excessively about germs. (With my recent spate of illness, I'm more at an Orange Advisory than is normal for me and, when living with children, one must keep more vigilant - i.e. don't let them sneeze in your mouth or eat ANYTHING they hand you.)

My relationship to viruses, germs and bacteria is one of healthy respect. I won't temp fate by eating bacon left out for three days, and the little germ bugs tend to mind their own business. All this seems pretty commonsensical to me and, I'm hoping, to most people.

Children are the obvious exception here because, as we all know, our spawn don't know shit about cleaning themselves. OR about not putting their little pie holes on non-mouth friendly objects.

(While on the EL with R., I witnessed him, to my horror, lick the area just under the window. He was going at it, too, like a friggin' lollipop. I grabbed him by the shoulders and said - in the the calmest way possible for I didn't want to alarm the poor child - "R., I cannot STRESS THIS ENOUGH. Never, and I mean NEVER, LICK ANYTHING ON THE TRAIN.")

All this said, I know there are people out there for whom the very existence of germs and bacteria are an obstacle to a normal life. Everyday they see a landscape swarming with disease.

What does that world look like? The good people at Lysol want to show you:



Aich. Ef. Ess.

I mean....Holy Fucking Shit, dude.

Did you SEE what was GROWING ON THAT KID'S HAND? And look, he's spreading it everywhere with a big fat smile on his face, that evil little twerp. Someone, ANYONE, stop him before...no wait, no WAIT...HE'S GOING FOR THE PACIFIER ON THE BABY'S MOUTH. THAT POOR SINLESS BABY IS GOING TO BE COATED IN HAIRY SHIT WORMS!

SOMEONE STOP HIM. SOMEONE. EFFING. STOP. HIM. WHERE'S THE FUCKING NATIONAL GUARD?!?!? ARE YOU GUYS NOT SEEING THIS?!?

Oh...thank god for Lysol. That's right, Lysol...kill those mother fucking germs....bring a rain of hellfire on those squirmy little effers and show them who is the SHERIFF of this town....I can hear their tiny little screams, like Mozart or something....watch while they wriggle and decay....yeah....YEAH...USA, USA USA!....But, hang on...



AUUUGH! AUUUUUUUUGGGGHHHHHH!

That kid didn't use toilet paper to wipe, I bet...Look. LOOK. At what he left dripping, DRIPPING, I tell you, on the toilet handle...Where's he going...where's he go- OH MY GOD...does he HAVE to touch EVERY FUCKING PEN?!?

That sweet little girl...don't...no, no, no, no, no.....DON'T! DON'T put that PEN, that CRAP COATED PEN, to your mouth....Oh...oh my god....oh, my god...

Oh...Lysol...thank god you're here to spray it all away. Spray the excrement from our human bodies and the filth from our dirty minds.

I need to go drink some bleach to kill the virus I caught just from WATCHING that thing.


There's a need to keep clean. I'm certainly not looking for a spicy case of botulism. But Lysol wants to turn us into a seething mass of mysophobes. For heaven's sake, isn't there enough to terrify us in the world without being told that everything we touch is hosed with fecal spores?

The Affable Fourth Reich

The Advertising Industry spends millions of dollars each year crafting the the ultimate spokesperson for their product. It's all part of the process of branding - taking a searing hot logo shaped iron to our brains and burning a permanent mark into our collective conscious.

Sometimes the spokesperson is something fanciful or magical, like the Hamburger Helper Hand, or the Energizer Bunny, or the Keebler Elves. These little guys arrive on the package to make our lives easier, longer lasting and more fun.

In other instances, the spokesperson is intended to be a representative of the people. A salt of the earth type who is inoffensive, kind, inviting, with a gentle sense of authority. The Everyman. These guys would not be so easy to find as one would believe. According the amount of play this representative of the masses gets on TV, in film, and on commercials, you'd think that the streets would be swarming with this fella. No...not really. Advertisers send teams far and wide to hunt this rare animal, only to return with the skins of fakers and failures. The huntsmen will prop up their trophies, display them to the tribe and, if the tribe responds poorly, they will gladly pitch the faulty skin aside and try another.

Cell phone commercials have a particular problem finding a trustworthy advocate. For a while, Sprint had a pretty good run with the black-coated government spook sent to calm fears over a wireless bill. T-Mobile employed the impossibly beautiful Catherine Zeta-Jones to inform families of all their wireless options. Cingular used that blob made of orange molecules. After a while, however, most of them vaporized in the blinding glory of the lightening trapped in a bottle by Verizon. The bespectacled "Can you hear me now?" guy has become as much a part our branded landscape as Ronald McDonald.

(Notice I'm not including the shameful campaign US Cellular attached to Joan Cusack. I love Joan. It was like having teeth filed down to see her utilized thus. Everyone's gotta pay the rent, I guess.)

The Verizon Guy did not start out as such a giant icon. At the time of his first appearance, he looked like a satisfying approximation if the Everyman, with plenty of gentle, authoritative inoffensiveness to go around. And then he ballooned up. The ubiquity of "Can you hear me now?" forced him into the role of paragon, rather than representative.

These days, the cellphone landscape has changed somewhat. The ideal Everyman no longer has to carry any gentle authority. In fact, it's best if he doesn't have any authority at all. He just has to be some ambition-free happy-go-lucky guy who makes us feel like we're all included in his vast network of good time buddies. He's that guy we can't hate, because there is nothing to hate. He has no strong opinions, no real goals. Just a mildly chiseled jaw, meticulous yet carefree hair, and a winning smile. Men are okay with him, women maybe want to make out with him at some point, but it's totally fine if they don't.

Enter Alltel. And Chad.



At first glance, there's really nothing to see. Chad, a forgettable nice guy is showing up the geeks with his new all inclusive circle. Easy enough. The commercial is informative and does what ads are supposed to. Sell the product.

But...Does anyone see something mild, yet insidious going on? Like a smiling, bland Hitlerjungend kindly telling the Jews, Homosexuals, Intellectuals and Communists how his brand of messaging is cheap, easy and open to everyone?

But it's just one commercial, and hardly propaganda.

Uh-huh.



BEHOLD! The Jew in his nest of Homosexual, Communist, and Intellectual cohorts conspiring to bring down the the glory of the Alltel. They are a scheming crew, aren't they? But the Reich shall prevail! COME AND GET YOUR LOVE!

(On an off note, what's it to them if Alltel takes over? These guys work in a mall and have no actual stake in the company do they? Aren't they going to college or have art showings at night? Jesus. Get it together guys.)

And Lo! The conspiracy broadens:



What shall they do with Chad? Where are they taking him? How angry, how resentful! Of course they are. These sub-humans were put on the planet to test our vanilla superman and are jealous of the network he has achieved. Look how calm and self assured he is, and how he fights fire with fire! Chad knows his opponent, and can turn his enemy's strengths to weakness in seconds.

Chad was not made this way. Oh no. Since Childhood he has been able to defeat his detractors.:



Must be the genes. Right?

And with his clean cut and unflappable recruiting power, the streets will be filled with legions of Chads in no time.

(Also, seriously - and I mean this for Chad as well - come ON fellas. The end of the avenue of goals CANNOT be working in a Cell Phone store. It mustn't. Move away, move on, move up. Make discoveries for your innermost selves. Don't waste your turn on this planet hocking wireless services. You may need it for now, to make money for later...there is no shame in that. But PULL IT TO-FUCKING-GETHER. All of you. )

I'm sure Altell would be shocked and horrified to think that their fool ad campaign presents even a remote allusion to WWII Nazi propaganda. I wonder how many of them, working on these commercials unknowingly borrowed from history's shadows. It's not their fault that pretty much any time you pit a blond man with good bone structure against an antagonist of brown haired complainers and rabble rousers that National Socialist images are bound to crop up.

No...not their fault at all.

But I am on alert. Alltel. I have my eye on you.

What Aliens Think of Our Party Habits

I don't know about you, but when I go out for a drink or two, I usually throw on a pair of jeans and a tee shirt and meet up with friends at a nearby watering hole. It's probably a dive with Boston on the jukebox and a ripped up pool table with two 9 balls. We haven't been able to smoke in bars in Chicago for a couple of years now, but the lingering odor of old second hand tar coats the air you breathe, mingling with smells of spilled, evaporated beer and urinal cakes. If we're lucky, there's karaoke and some poor bastard has opted to show us his heart by mangling Queensryche. I'll probably have about eight Vodka-and-something drinks. By night's end I will become a different person with my unashamed dance to Bon Jovi...and not "good" Bon Jovi, like Wanted or Livin' on a Prayer. I mean, It's my Life or Have a Nice Day Soccer Mom Bon Jovi. I'll even talk about how great it is that "he's still doing it, right?...making music...Good for him...It IS my life, know what I mean?" The evening will end with a precarious walk home, impulses to make ill-advised phone calls, heavy breathing as I make repeated attempts to unlock the door and a final gasp as I fall on the bed, into the quicksand of a dreamless sleep.

My night out for a drink has never looked a thing like this:




So, first of all, what the F is Disaronno? From my internet research it appears to some sort of almond liqueur but, as many liqueurs do, it looks like Robitussin. I have never tried it and am a little put off my the description of a "warm and sensual taste". Yee. There are many things that are warm and sensual, most of them I do not want in drink form.

I have yet to meet anyone who would call it their drink of choice.

However, this group of BFFs must have hit the jackpot by finding the one sepia toned bar in town that that ONLY sells Disaronno. There are a few unlabeled bottles scattered hither dither, but dang if the whole back shelf isn't lined from stem to stern with the those rectangular decanters. What a find!

And who ARE these people? Is it just me, or do they all possess a strange a-sexual extra-terrestrial innocence? There is the implication of sexuality, with the ice coming to the woman's lips, but the bartender's smile back at her reads like "Oh, neato, you can fit that clear water crystal into your face pocket." If we were to see these people stripped naked, I would be surprised to discover navels, genitals or hair.

And why are they laughing at the end? What is funny to replicants? Nothing. They watched a film strip on social rituals and saw that people bare their teeth and convulse when while experiencing pleasure in groups.



Alien Androids, before coming down to our planet to colonize, are very conscious of blending in, taking on our common social habits. So, they watched Less Than Zero and Bad Influence. This is what they came up with.

Again, the players in this ad don't have a visceral reaction to anything, merely curious observation. The two bartenders do their perfect cocktail dance and serve up two glasses of motor oil. What's this? She takes them both? What's going on? One person only gets one drink at a time! ONE DRINK AT A TIME. THAT'S WHAT THE MOTHERSHIP SAYS. Where is she going with TWO DRINKS?

Oh, wait. There are two females.

In an instance that should, I assume, come across as a guy moment ("Dude, awesome, we BOTH get one.") the two men look at each other and nod. I seriously doubt that either man is thinking of having sex with either woman. Or each other, for that matter. They are thinking, "Oh...she took the other drink for her identical twin. That makes sense."

This is what happens when Base 10 Mechas compute comedic irony.


Finally, moving away from the android aspect:



Lonely? Drink Disaronno by yourself, lick an envelope and send it, empty, to some guy. I don't believe I'm alone in thinking this to be unhealthy behavior. If I got that envelope in the mail, I'd put it in a plastic bag and take to my local precinct.



These commercials don't really make me angry, so much as bewildered. Who are these people selling to? It's certainly not me...or anyone I know. I have yet to encounter a bar or restaurant that stocks Disaronno, let alone displays it in bulk on its shelves. Where are they getting the money to produce these ads?

Must be the European market.

Or unbalanced ladies living in unfurnished garrots with a full bottle and envelopes.

Or Robot Aliens.

I don't care if it's directed by Michel Gondry

In lieu of my ad rant this week, I figured I'd post a less articulated gut reaction I have to a commercial that aired a few years ago. It's for Levi's and you can't get it on YouTube...you have to click on the link HERE.

Here is my reaction then...and now:

AUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH! AUUUUUUUUUUGH AUGH! AAAAUUUUUUGGGGHHHHHHHH!

(Sobs, passes out.)

Would you eat me? I'd eat me.

In Julian Baggini's book The Pig That Wants to be Eaten, he poses 100 short philosophical experiments, sort of like 2 minute mysteries written by Plato. In one of them, the experiment that shares the title of the book, Baggini invokes a moment from Douglas Adams' The Restaurant at the End of the Universe in which Max Berger is about to eat a plate of sausages and bacon:

"The sausages and bacon had come from a pig called Priscilla he had met the week before. The pig had been genetically engineered to be able to speak and, more importantly, to want to be eaten. Ending up on a human's table was Priscilla's lifetime ambition and she woke up on the day of her slaughter with a keen sense of anticipation. She had told all this to Max just before rushing off to the comfortable and humane slaughterhouse. Having heard her story, Max thought it would be disrespectful not to eat her."

At then end of all this Baggini offers questions over the morality of engineering such an animal, and, finally, eating it. If the animal is kept in a respectful and humane environment, and is delivered unto death in a peaceful and non-violent fashion, is there any reason to abstain from such a meal?

I will admit that I do have some strong misgivings over how the animals we eat are treated. I am also troubled by the basic notion that "If it don't have human consciousness, who gives a shit?" Just because an animal can't speak and express the same ideas about Being and Time that we can, doesn't mean that a certain other awareness doesn't exist.

All that said, I'm not a vegetarian. I eat meat on a regular basis. But I would not eat Priscilla the pig because I DO NOT WANT MY FOOD TALKING TO ME.

I do not want my food anthropomorphized on ANY LEVEL. I don't want it talking to me, telling me how delicious it is, I don't want it trying to seduce me into eating it, I don't want to see it getting dressed in little clothes and hoppity-skippity cheering as it heads full of glee to the apocalypse in my mouth.

I want it to be food. That's all. Food.

So why, OH WHY, do advertising companies want to show us images of food, talking, singing, dancing or any manner of human activities?? Why do they think its appetizing? WHY ARE THEY TRYING TO POISON MY MIND WITH THE IDEA THAT THE VERY FOOD I'M EATING MAY BE EXPERIENCING PAIN OF DEATH IN MY MOUTH AS I CHEW IT TO BITS AND THEN DISSOLVE IT IN THE ACIDS OF MY STOMACH (Oh, god, what if a piece of still-conscious being gets down my esophagus and into the gas chamber of my stomach...those creaks and growls from your belly? Those are screams.)

DON'T AMERICANS HAVE ENOUGH ISSUES WITH FOOD?



Great Scott.

Tell me this: Would we be in a rage to buy and eat McDonald's pressed chicken blobs if, at the end of this commercial, Ronald McDonald snatched up one of those little guys and took a big wet bite out of its ass? How quickly would the scene of cheering chicken dollops turn into a screaming frenzy as the GIANT CLOWN GOES ON RAMPAGE SCOOPING THEM UP, DUNKING THEM FACE FIRST INTO THE BBQ SAUCE AND SNARFING THEM DOWN. Would we stand for this slaughter of innocents?

Because they are, aren't they? Innocents? Foolishly weaving baskets and taking every pun literally, dunking THEMSELVES in a sauce of sugar and salt? Does McDonald's even realize that they are reinforcing PETA's principle that meat is indeed murder?



Oh, my god...someone call the police.

The saddest part about this is that the Cookie doesn't even know why he's there at first. He was invited, sure, but I bet he figured he was there to enjoy the birthday party.

I wonder if the children have been stalking him for months, waiting for just right moment. Jesus, is it even really her birthday?

And then, like a scene out of The Lottery, the children lean in with an ominous hunger, as the Cookie understands his fate. They cut before any real violence begins...but I wonder if he tries to make a break for it. If he is capable of understanding that the end is nigh, would he plead for his life? This has the makings of a telling societal allegory.



Ok...it's pretty funny.

But it doesn't make me want to eat the candy...it makes me want to befriend it. I don't want to be friends with my food. I WANT TO EAT IT.

The other disturbing thought about this commercial is, if you replace the M&M with a human, you have and unsettling allusion to Englishman William Hall who, in 1982 committed suicide by drilling 8 holes in his head.

Morbid? Oh, sure, but so are the advertising companies for setting up scenarios in which the ineluctable end consists of killing of a sentient being for our dining pleasure. Even in this last, arguably funny candy commercial, the implication stands that our little balding green friend could feel pain or even die...otherwise why NOT drill some ear holes for crying out loud?



The food we eat these days is such a quagmire. There is no end to the tangled web of moral, ethical, political and/or Health issues associated with what we put in our mouths on a daily basis. And I am very open to discussing these issues.

BUT I DO NOT WANT TO HAVE THIS DISCUSSION WITH THE FOOD.

Rap is Dead

Well, maybe not dead. It just got into a car accident and is living off a feeder tube, while friends and family search it's vacant eyes for signs of consciousness.

Perhaps it will revive itself, grow a new brain and awaken from its coma. Rap has died many deaths since the Sugarhill Gang, from "The Superbowl Shuffle" to the buffoonery of Vanilla Ice. Why not expect that it will rise like a Phoenix again?

I don't pretend to be a Rap connoisseur, nor do I have much more than a passing knowledge of its history. Like anything else, there are some songs I like, some I don't. But I am not blind to Rap as a cultural force.

Remember when Rap was just a fad? You, know, something for the kids like jelly shoes or Zima? I think that's what white culture prayed for - and always has when something new and extraordinary breaks from African American Culture. The same thing happened with Rock and Roll. "Oh, please, baby Jesus, deliver us into your gingerbread heaven from the scourge of beat driven sex music!"

But then, something more powerful than sex, more powerful than Baby Jesus dawned on the horizon. Money. As soon as the dollar reared it's head, it seemed like a new world. "You know what guys? I think we can SELL STUFF with this shit."

And lucky us. For in the wake of commerce we were subjected to some of the most astonishing advertising embarrassments ever. Here is but one:



Okay.

"We like this rap,
It really rocks,
But we'd rather jump
in the barbecue sauce,
'cause we're chick-en-en-en!"

I am aware that not every poem or rap has to conform to all the rules of style and meter but ROCKS AND SAUCE DOESN'T RHYME. YOU HAVE A TEAM OF PAID PROFESSIONALS WORKING ON THIS AND YOU CAN'T EVEN MAKE IT RHYME?!?!?!?

This commercial is the equivalent of the newly single next door neighbor coming over unannounced to make balloon animals for your son's 15th birthday. It's awkward and desperate, you wish it would end, but you kind of HAVE TO WATCH.

I will not go into my revulsion at the use of anthropomorphic food. That deserves a frothing post unto itself.

It is tough to say that this ad is even an insult to Rap, because it so far and away beyond what could even be considered hip-hop, its ridiculous. Like many firsts, though, it might be bumbling and self-conscious, but in the end, its blood paves the way for more insidious things to come.

Rap didn't go away. And neither did the advertising industry's attempts use it for the big sell. There are hundreds of commercials that blast rap as it's underscore to express how powerful the the SUV is, or how sexy that Beer is, or how indomitable this NFL team is. Raps have been written with more savvy to sell food, clothes and toys.

And now the recouperation of Rap as a challenge to the staus quo is complete:



Oh. My. God.

What better way to show the world that Rap has no power than to put two Douchbags in car at a Taco Bell drive thru, have them beat box about the glories of the value menu and then reiterate their Douchbaggery as they have a hissy tiff over DOUCHBAG 1 HAVING TO SPOT DOUCHEBAG 2 $0.89 FOR A BURRITO.

In my limited experience, Rap is about rising above, sex, money, machismo, social injustice, sticking it to the man, cop killing, wife strangling, swearing, exultation, degradation, mo' money and mo' problems, how it's hard out here for a pimp, authenticity and empowerment. It is a polarizing and pretty amazing art form.

And I can safely say, that this commercial is NOT about any of that. It takes it back, turns it on it's ear.

Machismo? Nope.
Authenticity? Authentically reductionist and "ironic", maybe.

Sex? Seriously, man. These guys are virgins.

Notice, there are no women in the car.

And there never will be.


Lastly, I want to make mention of the weird splicing in of the food in this ad. Like a subliminal insertion of porn, we are subjected to a slimy expulsion of Orange over a bed of Alpo. And it happens so fast it's like "Wha?"...all I know is that I am sad and queasy and a little violated.

Rap is dead. Long Live Rap.

Berserker Rage

Advertising...

(labored sigh)

It makes me tired. I think it makes pretty much everyone tired. Hostile, even.

It makes me hostile. When I see a commercial that hits me in just the right sweet spot of my smoldering fury, it's like trying suppress a cannonball once the fuse is lit.

For instance, there is a television ad running for pressed chicken circles. These lumpy prefab poultry zeroes are (were?) available for purchase at White Castle. The ad features a couple, a somewhat schlubby guy and his sort-of-hot wife, enjoying these chicken circles in their living room. The doorbell rings. Tension as the couple looks at one another...who will answer the door? Which one of them will sacrifice one single instant away from these succulent brown chicken circles? WHO WILL IT BE? Why, the sort-of-hot wife, of course!

Before she exits to the door, she turns and wags her sort-of-hot finger in his face, warning him not to steal any of her CC's. He nods and she leaves.

Now...NATURALLY, as he stews in his puddle of humanity, the buttery/peppery/bready/meatish aroma of the CC's snaps his resolve like a toothpick and he is completely unable to heed her warning. He, shifty grin and all, reaches for the chicken circles. Ack! They are too far away! Does he get up, sneak over to the chicken circles and snatch one for himself? Bah! Too easy and would probably waste too many calories. So what does our man do? He extends the antenna from the cordless landline (huh?) phone and hooks a few of the chicken circles, pulling them over to himself and cramming them into his maw.

(Sweating, swallowing urge to totally freak out)

This commercial is categorized in my mind as "The Douchebag Husband" Scenario...and it sends me into a complete tailspin. I mean, honestly, is this guy TOO LAZY TO EVEN GET UP TO STEAL A COUPLE OF CRAPPY CHICKEN RINGS FROM HIS WIFE THAT HE MUST ENGINEER SOME RUDIMENTARY TOOL IN ORDER TO STUFF MORE FOOD INTO HIS FEEDER HOLE???

AND WHILE WE'RE AT IT SHAME ON YOUR SORT-OF-HOT WIFE FOR ACCEPTING THAT KIND OF IDIOT BEHAVIOUR AS JUST ANOTHER PRICE ONE MUST PAY TO BE MARRIED. AWWW, ISN'T YOUR DOUCHEBAG HUSBAND A-CRAPPIN'-DORABLE?!? IN HIS SCHLUBBY, LAZY, THOUGHTLESS WAY?

But hey...it's just one commercial, right?

No. It's not. This is a scenario that plays out all the time in advertising: The moron husband (or boyfriend) goes to great legnths to preserve his pre-teen notions of marriage and his long suffering hottish wife (or girlfriend).

Part of the reason I have such a hair-trigger beef with advertising is because I hate the world they are trying to sell me. And it's not just because of the women, although that is part of it. I can't stand the idea of a world where the only thing men have to aspire to is sitting in a lazy boy, ordering pizza with buddies, drinkin' a bud light, and watching the game and barely cracking an awareness of the world around him. That kind of blissfully ignorant life would make me want to eat a gun barrel with chicken circles on the end of it.

I know. They are advertisements, after all, not meant to be taken too seriously. I will admit that there are many advertisements that are funny and fresh, and even a little informative about the product they are hocking.

But these images are pervasive. How many times a day do you see the douchebag scenario played out on TV? And how long before that shit seeps into your life and turns you into a douchebag?

Perhaps I will make it a weekly thing...starting now:



I want to make something perfectly clear. What people do in the privacy of their own homes is entirely up to them. I am in favor of people having fun, frisky consentual sex. I must say, though, that based on the back and forth movements here, this is the most vanilla orgy ever. Ain't nobody gettin' off.

And I won't deny the playful nature of this ad....but...

This commercial falls loosely into the category of "A beer is better than a woman". However, in this case, the woman doesn't even rate. She's just a place to put the awesome beer.

Remember girls, before you get too uppity, you are merely a collection of three dick sockets and a cup holder.