The Media Mediator

Mediating Gould

2008-11-23T10:10:00.000-08:00

After wrapping up his 1976 thriller “Marathon Man” Dustin Hoffman shared a meal with his costar and idol, Sir Laurence Olivier. Despite their separate origins (Hoffman is a American Jewish Method actor; Olivier was British and classically trained) Hoffman had a deep admiration for the older thespian, one which extended far beyond the confines of their shared profession. It was because of this respect that Hoffman asked Olivier, “Why do we do this? Why are we actors?” (That’s a paraphrase mind you, so don’t sue me Mr. Hoffman, et. al.).

Olivier, a lively chap with a refined taste for the theatrics, stared wide-eyed and unblinking at his young costar. After a dramatic pause he said “Look at me, look at me, look at me, look at me, look at me, look at…”

If one ever asks blogger Emily Gould why she does what she does, why she is a blogger, the answer, I suspect, would be “Look at me, look at me, look at me….”

If anyone knows about Gould it’s probably through the website Gawker.com and its controversial “Gawker-Stalker” feature, where people can phone-in celebrity sightings in real time. Outrage from this resulted in her infamous 2007 spat with Jimmy Kimmel in which she defended the website, saying “There is a shifting definition of what is public and what is private space…” Kimmel’s reaction, in which he mused aloud about her getting a text in Hell saying “You’ll never believe who’s here!” was no doubt shared by many viewers.

But what so many people find interesting or dangerous about her isn’t so much who she is but rather what she represents. Namely the disappearing boundary between public and private. Thus, she’s not the so much subject as just the participant in a larger discussion. But while the further encroachment of publicity into privacy is important it isn’t what jumped out at me after reading her article “Exposed”.

“Exposed” fascinated me because it was essentially a tale about addiction.

Addiction is confusing to most people, myself included. Your wife just left you but you won’t quit drinking...You’re going to jail but you won’t get off drugs...Why? This isn’t an insensitive diatribe but really just an admission of ignorance. I don’t get it. But if the only way to get it is to suffer from it then I’d just as soon stay in the dark.

Gould’s addiction was to blogging. Despite the consequences, she would always blog about what was on her mind, consequences be damned. Friend foe, intimate, stranger, in her blog no subject was safe. But that success was essentially a double-edged sword. The result, ultimately, was the destruction of face-to-face relationships for the sake of electronic ones. “Depending on how you looked at it…” she confides in us “…I either had no life and I barley talked to anyone, or I spoke to thousands of people constantly.”

Why would she do this? Why would she allow this to happen? “It’s easy to compare the initial thrill of evoking an immediate response to a blog post to the rush of getting high and the diminishing thrills to the process of becoming inured to a drug’s effects…” she explains to us. Going further, she notes that this “…metaphor is so exact, in fact, that maybe it isn’t a metaphor at all.”

Why?

I hate to make a diagnosis, one because it’s unfair to Gould and two because I’m not in any way shape or form qualified to do so. But I just have to go back to the Larry Olivier story. Look at me. Look at me. Look at me.

Was this why Gould did what she did? Out of some kind of reverse-voyeurism? The yearning to be watched? The need for celebrity? If so, she certainly suffered the consequences. “…by going on TV and having a daily blog presence in front of thousands of people, I had put myself in the category of ‘people who make their livings in public,’ and so, by my own delclared value system, I was an appropriate target for the kind of flak I was getting.”

The temptation is to view this as poetic justice. She got what she deserved we say. It’s irony certainly, that one who makes their living combating celebrity should become a member of that society as a result. But again, I go back to addiction. I don’t get it, but even still I won’t prematurely condemn it either. I just question it.

Every era must have its own “Have and Have-Nots”. We’ve mostly seen this division based on wealth and class. Those that don’t have it want it and will work hard for it. Perhaps now that division it based on celebrity. But is that really a noble pursuit? Surely the magazine covers, television specials, and internet sites dedicated to it tell us otherwise.

What have we learned from Emily Gould’s story? That ultimately she was “Exposed” not as a fraudulent journalist or a shallow reporter but as an addict. A person who yearned for the limelight of the computer screen. Upon achieving it, she wanted nothing more then to go back to anonymity. To obscurity. To normalcy.

Why do so many people put themselves and the ones they love through so much suffering? Why is the attention of the precious few so insignificant, yet the acknowledgement of the fleeting many so cherished? Why do we all want to be celebrities?

Look at me…look at me…look at me…look at me…look at me…look at….

Mediating Postrel

2008-11-18T19:52:00.000-08:00

“Finally!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

….is my response to Virginia Postrel’s insightful and much appreciated article “Consumer Vertigo”. Why “Finally!”? Because I started to worry, after reading so many authors convinced of our society’s bleakness, that to be smart you had to rail against the status quo. It’s nice to finally have a cultural critic who reaffirms our society and its values and who does so in an thoughtful and articulate way.

Yes Virginia, it is possible to be an intellectual and an optimist.

So what so great about this article that it inspired me to gush like a rosy-cheeked child? Well it’s essentially Postrel doing battle with the latest borderline nihilistic strand within cultural criticism. And, in my unfair and unabalanced opinion, winning. Yay!

The cultural critics’ argument, as summed up by Postrel, is that “Americans are facing a crisis of choice. We’re increasing unhappy, riddled with anxiety and regret, because we have so much freedom to decide what to do with our money and our lives.” In other words, back in the day, when we had less choice, and was saved the misery of having to choose between Gap and Levi’s or Smucker’s and Knott’s, we were consequently happier.

Such is not the case today, where we live in a world so obese with options that we become miserable at are inability to satisfy our gluttonous urge to try everything. “As the number of choices grows further, the negatives escalate until we become overloaded. At this point, choice no longer liberates, but debilitates. It might even be said to tyrannize.”

So the argument goes.

Now true believers I would not be an honest blogger if I didn’t admit that at first I saw some truth to this argument. What was my rationale? The DVR.

It’s awesome, right? Right. Likewise, the TV shows on right now have never been better. Therefore the options of what to watch and when are so tremendous that you can’t possibly satisfy yourself. You’ll tape every show, whether you really want to watch it or not. Shows you’d never watch in a million years at their regularly scheduled time suddenly start clogging up your DVR. When you can’t get to them, you feel like you’re really missing out on something. Therefore wouldn’t it be accurate to say that choice has made you debilitated, maybe even, dare I say it, tyrannized?

This was my thought process at first.

Then I thought of someone, anyone, from the Greatest Generation. My grandparent’s generation. Man, woman; black, white. It doesn’t matter. I just thought of an average person belonging to the generation that solved the Great Depression and extinguished Fascism to the ash-heap of history. And they said something to me, something profound, something I needed said to me:“You wimp! We didn’t have any TV!”

Pondering over that, I said to myself “You wimp! The Greatest Generation didn’t have any TV!”

What’s my point? Simply this: how incredibly remarkable is it that in the year 2008 (or 2005, when the article was written) we are complaining about having too many choices? Too many?! Born during the Depression and coming off age during war rationing our grandparents barely had any choices.

And they didn’t complain either!

Sometimes I worry that the one victim of progress is a sense of humility. When we have everything, we expect more. We demand more. But what’s more then everything? We forget that the choices we have come from our freedoms and that our freedoms, economic and democratic, didn’t grow from a tree. They were earned by our ancestors the hard way.

And so while I sometimes worry that our ancestors may be disappointed in us, I still can’t help but appreciate the irony. After all, how cool is it that we have so much that all we have to complain about is that we have too much? Not to be a Pollyanna, but perhaps we just gotta’ complain once and a while, and having so little to whine about, we whine about having too much.

With that said, on both a practical and philosophical level I reject the idea that choice is a bad thing. Such a contention is patently absurd. I echo Postrel’s counterargument that “…Choices about what and how to choose are not only voluntary but meaningful.” really struck a chord with me. Choices, she correctly asserts, “…help define who we are. And they preserve the essential value of abundant choice.”

Let me stress that the freedom to choose soap/shoes/fruit/etc. is not the same thing as the freedom to choose spouses/values/property/etc. Postrel does unfortunately allow them to overlap. Anyone who thinks that choice is the same as Liberty is making a mistake.

Remember this lesson, the most important one any of us can ever learn in the United States of America.

It is only, only, because we have economic and democratic freedom, those crucial, vital freedoms, that we have the freedom to choose. If you take away our right to vote, our right to keep our own profits, our right to own our own property, our right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness…if you take those away, then you can have all the different varieties of milk you want. It won’t be worth a hill of beans.

We only have the standard of living because we have the freedom. We only have plenty because our ancestors built our country from nothing. And if the plenty ever overwhelms us (resulting in say, I don’t know, a financial crisis) those freedoms will be what saves us.

But we can’t ever take them for granted. Government doesn’t give us our freedom, but as history has shown, they can take it away. Our duty is to protect that Liberty. That is our responsibility. As Postrel says “Liberty and responsibility really do go together; it’s not just a platitude. The more freedom we have to control our lives, the more responsibility we have for how they turn out.”

Maybe once in a while we just need someone from the Greatest Generation to come into our heads and remind each and everyone of us just how great we have it. And more importantly, how historically fragile our freedom is.

Finally.

Mediating Carr

2008-11-18T19:49:00.000-08:00

In his clear and readable essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Nicholas Carr contends that the Internet has changed the way we read and consequently the way we think. Using himself and his close friends as examples, Carr reveals that “The more [we] use the Web, the more [we] have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.”

How does this work?

The unprecedented convenience afforded to us by the Internet, with its ability to search and supply new information at speeds once thought unimaginable, has made us unwilling or unable to engage in deliberate thought. We don’t read, we scan. And we don’t think, we survey. As Carr confides to us “…what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away [at] my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles.”

In other words, he’s become intellectually lazy. Google has done maked him more stupider. So, dear reader, you must be asking yourself “What about you, Media Mediator? Has Google done made you more stupid?

Well consider this; the only reason I’m writing this blog right now is because I started to read a book and then got bored. So you do the math (if you can’t, your computer has a calculator). Frankly, it just seems the words I’m thrusting out upon the screen are far less intimidating then the endless stream of prose bounded together by a different writer in the book I’m reading…ahem…trying to read.

Why is that? Am I afraid to read? Am I lazy? Do I “gasp” dislike reading? Or worse yet, am I just refusing to admit it lest I out myself, (to my harshest critic…myself), as being “unsmart”?

Well, the truth is I love to read. So does Carr. And presumably, if you’ve put up with my blabbering this long, so do you. And that’s the scary part. We all love to read, but yet we aren’t doing it as much. Or when we do, it’s in fragments on a computer screen, not sentences on a page.

Why has reading become so hard?Well, I can’t speak for you, and Carr already has a whole essay. But for me, I really think it comes down to the material. Have you ever had a book that you were supposed to read and that you were supposed to like, but you found less stimulating then watching paint dry while grass grew? That happens to me…a lot.

I know that being a reasonably intelligent male enrolled at a prestigious University I’m supposed to “get” every great book, film, piece of art, culinary concoction, classical composition, Barack Obama speech, etc. But the fact is there are just some books out there that I couldn’t sit through even if the ink smelled like candy.

And the sad part is I still try.

I’m one of those people that will play-on through a book until the end. Win, lose or draw I have to finish a book if I start it. I figure that if I’ve come this far, why turn back now? (Even if “this far” happens to be page 5) I’m like the explorer sitting in a big pot above a campfire with salt getting poured on my head, yet still insisting the natives aren’t hostile.

Now, you put a history book in front of me and forget about it. Or a president’s biography? Goodbye week. It’s really just about finding what interests me. I probably waste too much free time trying reading “the classics” despite the fact I’m bored to tears and it takes forever.

Why? To convince myself I’m smart I guess. And smartness, as you know, is defined by your ability to read and love “War and Peace”. Therefore, by gosh, I’m gonna’ do it! Of course, it’d be much smarter to read two or three biographies in the time it takes me to read one antiquated piece of fiction. So it’s not so much that I’ve overestimated my intelligence as it is I waste time trying to reaffirm it. Or prove it.

In many ways this harkens back to Edward Sapir’s “On Fashion”, the Genesis of the modern media critics Bible. In it Sapir contends that over a lifetime we consistently affirm and reaffirm ourselves, to ourselves, and we do it by deviating from our normal activities and interests. And we do this to create an identity, one that is essentially the identity we desire. I’ll keep plowing a shovel into a book even if I’m not digging it because I think it says something about me. “He reads big books! And with small print too!” But do I like the books? Not necessarily. And while it may be a great piece of literature, if I’m not getting anything out of it, what have I accomplished?

There is much to be gained in the great works of literature, I would never deny that. And I adore many “classic” writers, like Dickens or Hawthorne for instance. But if I’m personally not enjoying a book then nothing is being gained. So the mere fact that I’m looking at a page with words on it isn’t in and of itself a beneficial experience. It is only if I “get” something from it, be it leisure, entertainment, enlightenment or some combination of the above. It may be great, but if it’s not for me then it’s not for me.

So I’m not sure the Internet has made me stupider. It would be hard for me to tell, as TV, the Internet and books each had comparable roles in my intellectual upbringing. It’s not like with Carr who grew up with books, only to be seduced in adulthood by the charming allures of the Internet.

Now, it’s made me lazier, sure. That point I will freely concede. Why research at the library when you can just “Google it”? While there is something almost spiritual about being in a library, surrounded by books, wafting in their smell, at the end of the day I’m an information-Unitarian; I’ll take the best pieces wherever I can get them.

The Internet is extraordinarily convenient, so much so that we may take it for granted. But that doesn’t mean we should become abstinent. It’s the Information Age, after all, so such a strategy would be self-defeating. Just be cautious. Know how to use a computer, but don’t be so lost in a library that you need to hire a Sherpa.

Unless you want to. Because that would be cool.

My Media Free Day: Or How I Learned To Rig The System and Come Out Ahead!

2008-11-04T15:33:00.000-08:00

Without thinking too hard on it, how do you start your day, usually? With a yawn and a stretch? Probably. With a shower, and brushing your teeth? Hopefully. With a cup of coffee? Likely. With a glance at the paper, TV or computer to see what’s up in the world? Definitely. You probably do all of these things everyday in whatever order or manner suits you best. Likewise you probably do them on cue, never really thinking about what you’re doing one way or the other. You just do them, almost on instinct.

But what if these rituals were taken away? Well, if you didn’t drink coffee you’d be cranky. If you didn’t stretch you’d be sore. And if you didn’t bathe, well, just be sure to bathe. Depriving yourself of most of these is actually fairly easy. All you have to do is remind yourself not to do them. You may suffer withdrawal, but that’s to be expected with any addiction. But what if your addiction isn’t stationary? What if simple abstinence isn’t possible? What if you tried to quit something “cold turkey”, only to have the turkey follow you wherever you go? That’s what happens when you try to quit the media. You can wake up and avoid the paper. You can resist turning on the television. You can even fight the urge to check “just one thing” on the computer. You can do all of those things, sure. But while you’re at it you might want to lock yourself in a closet somewhere because no one else is going to.

These are the problems I faced on Friday, September 12, the day I decided to scourge myself of any and all media (It was for a school assignment. I’m not crazy!) So how’d it go? Am I writing this within the confines of a padded cell? Are these words merely the semiliterate ranting of a madman?

Well, no, actually. I’m not in a padded cell, unless you’re one of those neo-Platonists who believes all reality is just a prison. I’m not a madman, though I have at times been both “mad” and a “man”. And finally, as you will soon discover, this rant can’t hardly be described as “semiliterate”.

As you’ve probably surmised I really didn't have too much trouble at all with my media free day. I didn’t go into convulsions or anything like that. It was actually a pretty normal, (albeit media-free), day. So I guess if you want to quit reading and move on now would be the time…bye…you’re still there, aren’t you?

Alright, well I bet you’re wondering why it was so easy. What about me is so special that I can ward off any media intrusion for a full 24 hours? You’re probably thinking one of two things: A.) He’s a salt-of-the-earth, man-of-the-plains type, like Henry David Thoreau; or B.) He’s full of it, exaggerating his story to inflate his own legend (also like Thoreau). Actually the answer is C.) He strategically chose September 12 for a reason, knowing that on this day it would be easiest to ward off the media.

So what happened on September 12 that was so advantageous to this project? Nothing special, just a Debate tournament. You see, I’m on the Debate team. Some people assume because of this that I’m intelligent. But don’t forget that one of the central lessons of Communication is the dangers of stereotypes.

Anyway, so I’m on the Debate team, and we are hosting a tournament that weekend. And to anyone who has ever been around a debate tournament you know that for 72 hours you are cut off from the outside world, ensconced in the gladiatorial arena of deliberation and discussion. Or something like that. Whatever it is it affords little time for indulging your media appetite. This is especially true when your coach assigns you to guard Keplinger Hall for hours…and hours. So when faced with this, um, “opportunity”, you might as well take it. At the beginning of the day, pre-Debate Tourney, I had more access to TV, Computer, etc. But it actually weren’t that bad. I just didn’t turn on the TV, Computer, etc. No withdrawals, nothing. I went to Spanish IV. No worries there. Then I went to Video Production: Studio. This could’ve been a problem and indeed the teacher did show a video. But it was literally a slide-show, literally. And while I was overwhelmed by the awesomeness of it, I think if I actually counted a slide-show as media then I might as well count the graffiti on my desk as media.

At the Debate tournament itself things were so chaotic that what free time I had was spent dutifully working on homework. No really, I’m not kidding. And how did I occupy myself while guarding Keplinger for hours…and hours? I read. And not on a screen either, but on paper, which apparently can hold words.

And I enjoyed it.

Personally, when I’m reading a book I love, then I almost regret having the option of turning on the TV. When you have the TV in your vicinity, it exists as a perpetual option for free time. If you hit a slow paragraph in an otherwise great book, well, let’s just see what Hannity and Colmes are up to. Five hours later you’re saying to yourself “I really wish I had more time to read.” For whatever reason even mediocre TV is still a strong adversary to a great book, while a mediocre book gets knocked to the moon every time by TV. But not on this occasion as there wasn’t any TV around and I was forbidden from watching it anyway!

Now, it is time to come clean and admit a transgression. One point in time I did accidentally send a text. Not a vapid “How r U doin? lol” text but something serious like “You want me to pick up milk?” I can’t remember exactly but it was basically something I could’ve called about but didn’t. And trust me, the very second I hit “Send” it hit me what I just did. Now I use the word “accidentally” on purpose because this wasn’t me deliberately, and/or obstinately, violating the terms of the agreement. I think I was just so busy, and indeed so cut off from the media, that it didn’t even occur to me what I was doing. I needed to send a message, I was in a hurry, why not send a text? And after I do so I realize “Wait! I’m not supposed to be sending texts.” Perhaps this tells the story more then anything. I didn’t cry, whimper, retreat or convulse throughout the whole day. I can’t say I was a trooper because I didn’t suffer. But when I needed to communicate quickly I sent a text. In other words, I did it on cue, without even thinking about it.

The rest of the day went by smoothly. I figured this infraction was minor enough that it wasn’t worth abandoning ship and jumping into the media ocean over. I caught myself and didn’t do it again. And after the Debate tournament ended for the day I went home, ate, read, and went to bed. So for all intents and purposes my day was media free. Or if it wasn’t media free it was at least 1/100 of $0.01.

Right?

The lesson I learned is that the media isn’t something that you need but something that you want. It’s convenient. It’s fun. It passes the time. It can fill the time. It’s not an enemy or even a problem, unless you let it be. But even if you try to avoid it entirely, to purge it from your existence, you’ll ultimately fail. Not so much because it tempts you back into acquiescence, but because it’s just so natural to your everyday routine that you don’t even think about it. It’s like a cup of coffee in the morning. It’s just something you do. And if you take it away the reaction may not be violent, but certainly noticeable. You won’t break out in hives or a cold sweat but you will miss it.

Then again, what do I know? I only did it for one day! And I even screwed that up! Aw well…I think I’m gonna’ go see what’s on TV.

Mediating de Zengotita

2008-11-04T15:30:00.001-08:00

Thomas de Zengotita is upset.

Like so many media critics, he believes that we’re being duped. The culture in general, and the media in particular, are turning us into something akin to zombies. We plod about out daily lives aimlessly and mindlessly consuming culture. And the worse part is, we don’t even know or care. We have been numbed. Hence the title of his 2002 Harper’s essay “The Numbing of The American Mind”.

By taking this stance de Zengotita is not being especially original as many, if not most, cultural critics stand firmly against the rushing tide of the media. What gives his argument weight is how he relates it back to the definitive event of our time. September 11, 2001.

The author reminds us how after 9/11 things were supposed to be different. Life was supposed to be different. The vain, the trivial, the silly; all were supposed to be washed away in a Great Flood at which point we’d emerge from the Ark to a changed world. This was exemplified by the oft-repeated phrase “Since the events of 9/11…”

However “since the events of 9/11…” things haven’t changed. de Zengotita say we’re still basically the same. He can’t understand how, after what was by every objective measure the definitive event of our time, we are still the same people, doing the same things and living in the same way as on 9/10.

What so many cultural critics have warned us about has finally happened. If 9/11, the ultimate reality check, didn’t wake us up to the fact that there’s more to life then TV’s and cars, then nothing will.

But is it true?

We are in the middle of the “Information Revolution”, as de Zengotita suggests, where history is written and recorded as it is occurring. We can be so caught up in tomorrow that we ignore today and forget yesterday. The present has no relevancy if it conflicts with the decided upon future. There are many examples of this happening.

Without appearing partisan, most coverage of Sen. Obama has made it appear he’s already President, especially in these last few weeks. All we hear is how Sen. McCain has no chance. Whatsoever. Not in a million years. It’ll be a route. Oh, and he’s real old too, you know.

So why vote? Why make your voice heard when it is being ignored? Why should we “Rock The Vote” or “Vote Or Die!” when a truly different opinion is disparaged? Likewise the current President is the quintessence of an afterthought. Is he even still President, really? I don’t even know. We’ve already decided to move on. Bush is history now, something that even he has accepted. Even celebrated, it seems.

The future is already written. In our foolish conviction that we can control the uncontrollable we’ve decided that the cause-and-effect of history is outdated. The present is all but irrelevant. The past? Forget about it.

This can be dangerous.

If Vietnam was the first war we could watch on TV then Iraq is the first we can follow, as it happens, 24/7. The result is that we feel our soldiers’ suffering but we don’t comprehend their sacrifice. No sacrifice for a greater good is occurring in our 24/7 TV narratives. Only the tragic story of noble yet naïve young men being tricked into giving their lives for a lie. That is what we feel. That is what we comprehend. Nothing else. In such a world no war is ever justified. Ever. Is that world safe? The answer, of course, is not.

On the one hand, to live for the future is a wonderful, optimistic thought. But like the road to hell, it can be a bad thing. Especially when the forgotten yesterday was 9/11.

This what gives de Zengotita’s case weight. When other cultural critics argue that by living in this cultural machine we are depriving ourselves of the “good life”, they just sound arrogant. By making the case that in forgetting 9/11 we have crossed a line de Zengotita makes his argument relevant and important.

That’s why it’s a shame he abandons it so quickly. Instead of saying why forgetting 9/11 is bad he just drops it. He treats it as a symptom not a problem. The real problem, the “numbing of America”, is just restating what his predecessors and peers have beaten into the ground.

I agree that the seven years since 9/11 have become ancient history before their time. I find this troubling. If those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it then what is to stop another 9/11 from happening? Or worse?

Yes, we shouldn’t let those events hover like a black cloud over our heads forever. Indeed, it is cathartic not to dwell on the past. The mark of a great society is that it makes prosperity out of tragedy, not just more tragedy.

And we are a great society. The greatest.

Perhaps what’s being argued here is when do current events end and history begins? When does today become yesterday? When does the newspaper become the history book? When is “moving on” less dangerous then “never forgetting”? That is a question only we can answer for ourselves.

The tragedy of 9/11 is still a very real part of our world. Forgetting it would be tragic on the one hand and foolish on the other. It was de Zengotita’s decision (and I believe a bad one at that) to use 9/11 as a prop for a different argument when clearly forgetting 9/11 is the argument. So often critiquing culture can be like critiquing your own shadow; it’s always there and at the end of the day it’s just a reflection of yourself.

That is my problem with Thomas de Zengotita.

Mediating Naomi Klein

2008-11-04T15:29:00.000-08:00

It’s fortuitous that while pondering what to write about Naomi Klein I was engaged in a deep, proactive and illuminating philosophical debate with my oldest and dearest friend; Television. Ironically enough I was watching “Mad Men”. “Mad Men”, for those of you not in the know, is a drama about 1960’s Madison Avenue Ad Men (Get it? Mad. Ave. Ad Men = Mad Men?). It’s also this years “greatest show ever”.

The central character, Donald Draper, was suffering a personal crisis while his company took on a new direction. The new direction was to focus on selling an image. The engineer of this shift, Herman Phillips, described the change by saying that people buy things when things are good and don’t when things are bad so why focus on just selling stuff? Why not sell an image?

Draper, an old-timer at heart, condemned this shift, declaring “I sell products, not advertising.”

Somewhere Naomi Klein is smiling.

Unlike so many cultural critics who fire at moving targets, Klein has a specific one: branding. Channeling Draper, Klein tells us “…branding is not about advertising but about the end of advertising.” She believes we live in a branded world, where “The measure of a successful brand…is how well it stretches into other areas, not whether it’s a mark of quality…”

The way it used to be, Klein implies, is that a Producer would create a product, focusing solely on its quality. That was the Producers sole ambition: Is this a good product? Because of this strenuous commitment to quality, not much time was left for promoting the product. Cue the Advertisers.

However, in the branded world, the Producer no longer exists. Only the Advertiser does. And his job is to sell something, anything. He makes a product for that sole purpose. Whether it’s good or not is irrelevant. It’s not about selling something produced but producing something to sell.

That product is “the brand”.

And as long as people associate the brand with something abstract, like “happiness” or “coolness”, they’ll buy anything from it. If people associate Nike with “coolness” enough, they’ll buy a rusty nail and call it a shoe. As Klein says “…this latest development in branding is that it is not so much the product that is branded as the consumer…”

It goes without saying that a “branded world” is a dangerous one. What is up for debate is whether or not we actually live in one.

Well, yes and no.

It does seem that brands have infected many spheres of the public space. There’s something inherently unpleasant about seeing an “El Grande” burrito ad in a bathroom stall for example.

Likewise, some ads don’t seem to be selling their product at all. I’m thinking about that Pepsi ad from the 1990’s with Shaquille O’Neal where he was presented as some sort of god. The “Shaft” theme played in the background, only replaced with “Shaq!” What in the world did that ad have to do with Pepsi? Ya’ got me. Except at the end when Michael J. Fox wouldn’t give him his Pepsi, all it really did was just show how great Shaq was.

The most egregious example (to me, at least) happened in the late 1990’s. This period was when the “blockbuster mentality”, in the negative sense, hit its zenith. If a movie came out during the summer, chances are it was made solely to sell toys. Notable victims include “Godzilla”, “Armageddon” and “Batman and Robin”. “Batman and Robin” was so bad it didn’t just kill one of the most successful franchises in history, but brutally murdered it. And really, what reason did Mr. Freeze have a car for other then to make a toy of it?

But for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction and every cloud has its silver lining, right? After all, had it not been for the abject failure of “Batman and Robin”, we’d have never gotten “Batman Begins” and “The Dark Knight”. Really, we wouldn’t have. It was only after going completely over the gratuitous marketing cliff could the franchise right itself.

That’s a pretty good example of how I think the system works. The boat may hit some rough waters, but it will right itself.

Yes I will freely concede that there are some salesmen out there would put ads on headstones if they could (“What do you want on your Tombstone? Pepperoni and cheese!”). It reminds me of a Monopoly game with my cousin where he started buying, and renting, not just the colored blocks, but the “Free Parking” and “Proceed To Go” spaces.

That’s pretty low, right?

Ironically enough he now wants to be a history professor and advocates “Democratic Socialism”. This summer he tried to sell me some trinket not worth the plastic it was made out of. That’s when it hit me; this “Democratic Socialist” cousin of mine is the most ruthless capitalist that I know.

I bring that up every chance I get.

So yes, there will always be those who will sell anything, regardless of quality. However, it isn’t the Free Market that is at fault. Just look at the Chinese toys and pet food. Ruthless Capitalism isn’t the same thing as a Free Market. I believe a Free Market will weed that stuff out. If you make a bad product, and you lack the benefit of government subsidies, you won’t be able to get your company off the ground. It’s that simple.

Besides, I know there are good salesmen out there. They are men and women who are on the lookout for good products and just want to spread the world about them. That’s a very good thing. And if the product is so good that it becomes a brand that’s great. They’ve earned it. But the quality should justify the branding.

I imagine Donald Draper would feel the same way.