I have always hated television ads. Always. The more sophisticated the lie, the
angrier I tend to get.
I suspect that, secretly, I’m embarrassed by my own gullibility--I
actually purchased Sham-Wows several years ago. You remember Sham-Wows; a really
unattractive man with a funny haircut talking a mile-a-minute about how his
product could suck up 100 times its weight in water? They would save me thousands
of dollars by replacing the single roll of paper towels I use up every week? Yes,
those Sham-Wows.
Anyway. I found a recent Cadillac ad run during the Olympics
to be particularly offensive and stupid, leaving me wondering who in the world
would be taken in by the assumptions made.
You may have seen it. Good-looking grey-haired man in early
middle-age is strolling through his (fabulous) home, tousling the hair of his
attractive if androgynous offspring. He lectures as he walks, telling us why
the American work ethics trumps all others, and informs us that other nations
take all of the month of August off! Holy cow! How lazy and indolent can you
get? Also, Americans got to the moon by
not taking the month of August off, and left the moon because they got bored.
Me, I’m thinking this guy is a moron, a handsome moron, mind
you, not only sadly uninformed about things like NASA budget cuts, but obviously
ignorant of the recent research that shows the American work ethic:
- has changed drastically in the past few years, and sadly, not for the better;
- is generally not that healthy physically or emotionally, and
- is considered by the majority of workers to be generally unrewarding.
After his chauvinistic soliloquy, the guy climbs into a
Cadillac--his reward, I assume, for being incredibly ill-informed.
A Caddy? Really? That’s what we should aspire to for not
taking vacation? Personally, were I a full-of-bucks executive making a half-a-mil-or-so
a year, as the ad would like us to believe this particular guy is, I’d buy
something better than a Caddy, a car that right now looks sort of like a luxury
Toyota with fatter tires and better interior lighting. Give me an Aston-Martin, a high-end Mercedes,
a Maserati, something with a little class and not completely mass-manufactured\,
something with good resale value that will not lose 30 percent of its worth
when driven off the lot;
Unless the guy is planning to buy a collection of white
shoes and move to Florida. I suppose
that’s a possibility.
I have a feeling this ad will backfire. It stupidly insults
other cultures, talks down to potential buyers, misstates facts, and allows a
glimpse at the type of smug and condescending American truly not much liked the
world over
A Cadillac.
Sheesh.
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