Why do I watch commercials at all?

[amanda_lodden]

The DVR remote was waaaaay over there, and I was lazy. This means that I saw a commercial. This was a mistake.

The commercial was for a first-person shooter computer game, which I refuse to name because it doesn't deserve any extra publicity. The music for the commercial? Jay-Z's "99 Problems." Not familiar with it? That's okay, you probably just have taste or something. But I bet you've been exposed to the chorus, which is "I've got 99 problems but a bitch ain't one." The commercial repeats the chorus over and over, bleeping out "bitch."

... and I have to ask, exactly what do they think they're saying with that choice? That women don't play computer games? That people (presumably men) who play computer games don't have girlfriends? No matter how you slice it, they're pretty much insulting everyone who plays their game.

Have we as a society gotten so jaded about advertising that we just ignore it when marketers openly insult us, and buy their products anyway? Really?

Comments

[roseneko.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I forget exactly how sheltered I am - no cable TV, ad-blockers installed on my browser, listening to public radio. Then I happen by a friend's house while their family's watching something, or look something up on a work computer, and the ridiculous scale of it all completely blindsides me - there are ads everywhere. And yet when I ask my friend how they put up with it, they inevitably give me a blank look and ask "What do you mean?" It's amazing how easy it is to acclimate, too.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

Hunh. I never knew Jay Z covered that. I was sad Ice T wrote it in the first place.

[allanh.livejournal.com]

Write the company's president.

No, seriously. Write and send a [paper] letter.

I have found that writing company presidents and CEOs at worst produces no visible result. At best, however, I have been surprised at the changes that have been put into effect after I've written a letter.

If you dig back in your memory (or my LJ), you may recall that I was plenty pissed off that Target discontinued their house brand of yogurt, which was both cheap and healthy (no HFCS). I wrote their CEO a letter. They sent me a $5 gift card, and I thought, "OK, fine. I'll buy my yogurt elsewhere."

Then a month later, I got a letter from one of the CEO's assistants, asking which of the various yogurt flavors were my favorite?

Three months later, the yogurt was back on the store shelves.

I am not stupid enough to think that this was done because of me...but because I was very likely one of many, many people to express my opinion to the CEO's office, a change was created.

You are probably not the only person offended by the commercial. (If I watched TV, I'd be highly offended, too.) Writing the CEO to let him or her know may not seem like much of an action to take...but your letter might be the tipping point to steering the company towards a more appropriate advertising campaign.

Remember the yogurt. You never know.

[sorcycat.livejournal.com]

The new Dr. Pepper ad pissed me off so much. Apparently it's now socially appropriate and hilariously funny to be so brazenly anti-women. Grrrr!

[droewyn.livejournal.com]

Have we as a society gotten so jaded about advertising that we just ignore it when marketers openly insult us, and buy their products anyway? Really?

Given the number of geeks who squeed over this highly insulting ad because it's about US!!... pretty much, yeah.