January 8th, 2009
The State of Advertising: Boring, Stupid, Awful
I’m borrowing this line from a Buddhist teacher of mine who says this about TV in general. “There are just three channels on your TV,” he says, “I know you think you’ve got cable so you’ve got hundreds of channels, but you’re wrong. There are three: Boring, Stupid, and Awful.” He advocates for getting rid of the set altogether.
I haven’t been able to do that…yet. But I have been able to stop watching advertising. And the less I watch the more I see that advertising itself (with a few exceptions) has become nothing but boring, stupid, and awful.
“But wait,” you say, “I like those GEICO cavemen.”
To that I say: Boring. Stupid. Awful. Take a look around you and really notice the ads you’re absorbing.
Most of them are boring. They have nothing to say, the layout is bad, the colors are offensive, and the people are dressed in clothes denuded of all personality and character. What is the point? What is the freakin’ point of half the ads we’re subjected to? I have worked in advertising and I know how much time, energy, emotion, and money was poured into those boring ads. It’s a shame.
If they’re not boring, they’re probably stupid. When you really take a hard look at most ads they’re so stupid as to be downright offensive. I can’t believe people aren’t more outraged (yes, there is outrage but not enough). The way men are portrayed in beer ads, the way teens are portrayed in cell phone ads, the way women are portrayed in food ads…we should be in the streets. The stereotypes are trite and clichéd when they’re not dangerous. Humor, which can be a powerful tool in advertising, is also just plain stupid most of the time these days. Can we all agree that the convention of “humorously” absurdist scenarios taking place in the modern office environment is overplayed and…say it with me: STUPID?
Which brings us to the third and most offensive of categories: Awful. A couple of weeks ago a friend and I got off the subway to be confronted with an enormous, larger than life, image of a man wearing the face of a presumably dead person. This ad was for a treasure of filmmaking (don’t get me started on Hollywood) called Saw 5. I actually retched. This was not something we wanted to see or set out to watch. If you’re into Saw, that’s your prerogative. My friend promptly grabbed the corner of the poster and ripped it off the wall in one swift motion. Normally I am not a supporter of vandalism or civil disobedience, but in this case it seemed entirely appropriate. We had been assaulted. It was an act of self-defense. (I am, incidentally, a big fan of the clever defacing of subway advertising that happens in NYC.)
I don’t think this has to be the case. I still believe advertising can be inspirational, effective, creative and motivating. We just need to step it up, people. Advertising created out of obligation is boring. Advertising created out of ignorance is stupid. Advertising created out of desperation or fear is awful. Let’s set our intention to a positive channel and start making ads that move people. Or let’s not waste the time, money and human effort.