Hardly A Non-Conformist

So I went to bed last night for a few hours, and in typical fashion I set the timer on my tv for about half an hour, and rolled over the other way to start drifting off to sleep.

Suddenly I was jerked out of my semi-conscience state when I overheard something that I knew couldn't be true.

It was an ad for McDonalds, where the dickhole on tv was like "I'm a non-conformist, I eat at McDonalds!"

....I find this direction in advertising very discomforting.

Ok, first off, where the hell does Mickey D's get off on playing the "non-conformity" card when they proudly advertise that they've served literally BILLIONS of people since their inseption into Main Stream Americana back in like, 1955?

Bitch, your great-grandfather has probably eaten a McDonald's fish sandwich, is what I'm saying.

Has "non-conformity" totally lost it's meaning in today's society? People are so demanding of a non-conformist state, to fight back and bite the hand that feeds them, that it's now spread into the most conformist medium of all, advertising?

The very idea behind advertising is to get as many people as possible to "conform" to one idea or product. This is how companies generate dollars so that the people who work for these companies can drive home in their expensive cars to their expensive houses and get 'luded up on expensive prescription drugs.

In other words, advertisers think we're all sheep. And for the most part, they're right.

Another great example of the non-conformity trend in advertisement is that AARP or ... fucking... whatever Dennis Hopper's shilling for lately. Here's this iconic symbol of perpetual non-conformity in the form of an actor who got his start being the ultimate non-conformist in the film "Easy Rider," telling wisened baby-boomers to conform to a special interest group so they can save on medicine and afternoon movie tickets. All the while there's some catchy 60's pop hit playing in the background, and footage of some graying old guy carrying a surf board across the beach. I can only imagine the numbers of achy-jointed retirees being like "hey, I still got what it takes, I can get out there and show the world I'm not done yet! I won't conform to these standards set upon me by society in general, half expectant of me to slowly and quietly die in my own feces stained boxer shorts with baked beans running down my chin in my favorite Laz-E-Boy! No! I'll give them what-for!"

You and everyone else, grampa.

I'm just tired of this game that advertisers want to play with Americans because they (by and large) think we're collectively dumb bovines being lead to the slaughter floor. McDonald's is probably the most culturally significant icon in America and for them to say their customers (myself included) are non-conformists (all like, 80 billion or whatever) is ludacris. This makes as much sense as them selling customer's fucking salads.

Just stop feedings us lines of shit (both literally and figuratively) and come out and say "hey, if it was good enough for four prior generations of obese Americans, it's good enough for you too," and I'll be happy. It's not like when I was living in NYC that I never saw some skinny hipster kid eating a Quarter Pounder with Cheese...

There is no such thing as a non-conformer anymore. Everyone conforms to the same ideas because there's no new ideas to be had. No one thinks for themselves anymore. We're spoon-fed opinions by different media sources and we align ourselves with which makes us feel more empowered.

The other night The Lady and I were out on my porch drinking scotch and talking politics, which was uncommon, but probably due to our mutual inebriation. She brought up the fact that people no longer have their own opinions and that we collectively do what we're told by whoever. Sadly she's right. People don't take the time to digest information anymore. We're literally traveling down the road to a place where we're told what to think.

I'm serious.

The solution to all of this is that we need to stop not conforming. If the powers that be are happy to let us think we're all special and unique individuals, they'll keep pandering to us as such. If we can prove to them that we're one cohesive body with our own opinions (conforming behind one original idea or belief) we're a harder stone to push, and maybe America can un-stick itself from the toilet it's been trapped on as it tries to finish digesting sixty years of Chicken McNuggets.

On The Road: The Blackberry Chronicles

"Introducing new Bud Light with Lime!"

..... Sooo you've basically invented Corona with the lime already in it.... Congratulations.

Mountain Dew is Making Me Sick For Other Reasons Than its Taste

As always, I'm up late sitting at my computer with my iTunes on and the tv on at the same time. Why do I do this? Because everyone else between the ages of 15 and 30 do this. We all sit in front of our computers, typing away, whether it's in an IM box, a Facebook wall post, whatever, and we keep our music on with the tv on at the same time.

It's part of our culture: to have as many screens in our faces at any given time, being overloaded with as much media as possible. We literally want to stuff out faces with as much stimulus as we can get our hands on.

What will our predecessors think of this? Not much, considering they'll be too busy uploading the latest episodes of The Real World to their rotting organic brains, slowly being replaced by cybernetics like something out of "Ghost in a Shell."

Speaking of "Ghost in a Shell" I haven't watched that in forever. Damnit I miss my tivo.

Anyway, I'm getting super off track. My gripe tonight is this commercial I saw while watching Kevin James' stand up special on Comedy Central. Apparently the people at Mountain Dew want to experiment in open democracy by having their... um, drinkers? Fans? What do you call people who religiously buy a product, anyway? ... Consumers falls short. Whatever, not important.

Anyway, Mountain Dew wants YOU to join the "Dew-ocracy" (groan). You, the consumer, get to choose the color scheme, name, possibly the flavor, how much Yellow-Five, whatever, goes on the new Mountain Dew. This tells me two things: Mountain Dew has either fired it's entire ad department/the ad department is on vacation, or Mountain Dew wants to take it to the "Extreme!" and have a carbonated drink named "Shizzle Dizzle Fa Rizzle Soda" or "Yo This Shit Be Good Soda."

At this point in the article it'd be easy for any of my readers to claim I have zero faith in democracy in any capacity, from Presidential Elections on down to the naming of soft drinks, and my readers would be right. I mean, we got the Presidency wrong - twice - America, do I really trust us with naming a can of soda?

Fuck to the no I don't.

And besides, who the hell drinks Mountain Dew so religiously that they would jump at the chance to be the guy who names and designs the latest Pepsi product to be born stillborn? Need I bring up Mountain Dew Red Alert? How about Chrystal Pepsi? I could name a hundred more, but I don't keep a long-term memory for things that totally suck on balls.

Hence why I can't make hilarious "Fraiser" episode references.

The point I'm trying to make is that as noble of an attempt it is for the people down at Pepsico to get kids (and it's primarily kids this is targeting. You should see the ad, it's a ridiculous amount of production. I'll try to find it and embed it at the end of this article, but you'll see who exactly this is geared towards. They make no attempt to try to hide what demographic they're targeting.) interested in voting for something. But it's all for not; no one is going to be interested, no one wants to be that guy who's going to be walking down the street, see "his" Mountain Dew being consumed and go "Yo DUDE! I fucking named that SHIT!"

What would the response be? What would you say to someone who came up to you and said "hey I named that product you're using." You know what I'd say? I'd say:

"So?"

So here's the bottom line (cuz Stone Cold said so...), ignore this propaganda. The fact that I'm talking about it sickens me anyway, but I've been dry on articles since resurfacing into reality last week, and I'm trying to catch up. But c'mon, to insinuate that your average skate boarding 17 year old is the next jungle war fighting revolutionary because he picked which berry the next Mountain Dew is going to taste like is disrespectful to actual jungle war fighting revolutionaries.

Besides, jungle war fighting revolutionaries drink actual mountain dew, from a dented canteen.

The Ford Motor Company Thinks We're Idiots.

I take notice when I see a brand new Ford F-150, in black, rolling up behind me at a stop sign or on the highway or whatever. It's a mean looking truck with a big grille. I'm actually kinda surprised that Michael Bay didn't use one in his Transformers film.

Oh that's right, GM footed the bill.

Anyway, Ford is kicking a whole lot of ass in the automobile manufacturing thing. Granted, they don't make their vehicles in the United States anymore, and well, there was that whole "Explorer Roll Over" thing from a few years ago but for the most part, their product design and marketing is smoking the competition.

That was, until I saw their latest series of television ads.

Instead of explaining the ads to you, let me break down the meeting between the ad exec and the CEO of Ford Motor Company:

"Ok, we got this whole new approach to our advertisements in the first quarter," says the ad exec.

"I'd love to hear it." Says the CEO.

"Ok, what's better than a customer testimonial?"

"I don't know, customer testimonials are pretty solid,"

"I know, but what if we could get non-Ford owners to say how much they love our cars, without them actually buying one?"

"My god, how could we pull off such a feet?"

"Well, we'll track down some 'average Americans', the shittier their car the better. If they drive a GM or a Toyota, even better! We'll lend them one of our brand new, top of the line automobiles for a week. I'm talking the best editions, with the in-dash video screens and leather interiors. You know, the 60K models."

"I think I see where you're going with this, but go on..."

"We'll lend them these cars, then take them back and then have them look into a camera and say how much they enjoyed the 'Ford Experience.' It's fool proof."

"You're right, American buyers will eat it up, because they're idiots. They'll never realize that we've taken someone's shitty, horrible, takes-three-good-hard-turns-of-the-key-to-start cars, with the paint peeling off of them, and replaced it with a brand new 2008 model of one of our pricier models. This is genius!"

So there, Ford thinks Americans are idiots. I mean, who else could possibly be hypnotized by some 'average Americans' thinking that a brand-new Ford is vastly superior to a GM that's 15 years older?

I enjoy the ride in a Ford, and I've had far too many bad experiences with GM vehicles to have much faith in them much longer. But still, if the Ford Motor Company really wants to sell more cars, I would recommend to them that they starting treating their perspective customers as more than complete imbeciles.