Packerjohn
Packerjohn
- Location
- Canada
This morning I finished reading a book by Michael Palin called "North Korea Journal". Anyone here from the UK or familiar with Monty Python shows will recognize the name, Michael Palin. Anyway, in the end of the book, as he is leaving North Korea to fly back to China, he writes:
"I've been quite comfortable here. I've appreciated the neatness, tidiness and politieness of those we're met. I've relished the lack of pollution and not for one moment missed the internet, the smartphone or the jarring, screeching, continuously in-your-face advertising of the west".
Now, I'm not here to discuss politics but I would like your reaction to advertising. Where I live we are "swamped" with massive advertising. It's on cable TV relentlessly, you get it in your mailboxes, the streets are so full of it that I often find it difficult to find the small street signs, the stores are often shouting at you to buy something, the cheap hamburger restaurants have TVs all over their walls with all sorts of advertising, the benches where you wait for buses are full of advertising something or other, the highways have advertising signs that spoil your enjoyment of nature, go to movie you pay for & you have to sit & watch that stupid white bear drinking that Coca-cola that is bad for your health & log on to Face-book & there you are..... more adds for junk you don't need. In the last few years there is a new form of advertising. In the city where I live, nearly all the trucks & cars that have any kind of business are driving around with large advertising signs telling us about their business with a phone number & their websites. It's like there is no more quality of life anymore. Every thing seems to be geared to get every last penny out of the gutless consumer one way or another. It seems everyone accepts this but do you? We talk about climate change & we hear that our land fills are getting full & we are sending our garbage over to Asia but still we shop until we drop, get ourselves up again & again shop until we drop. Have you ever thought that enough is enough when it comes to advertising? This is me talking to you. Me who cut the cable TV 16 years ago because he didn't like the demeaning advertising. What do you think? PS: Don't mean to rant & rave so much but most people in the know call the overload of advertising signs Visual Pollution. There is, of course, noise pollution that we often complaint about in some of the stores/restaurants but visual pollution in cities is a problem because it could conflict with safe driving.
"I've been quite comfortable here. I've appreciated the neatness, tidiness and politieness of those we're met. I've relished the lack of pollution and not for one moment missed the internet, the smartphone or the jarring, screeching, continuously in-your-face advertising of the west".
Now, I'm not here to discuss politics but I would like your reaction to advertising. Where I live we are "swamped" with massive advertising. It's on cable TV relentlessly, you get it in your mailboxes, the streets are so full of it that I often find it difficult to find the small street signs, the stores are often shouting at you to buy something, the cheap hamburger restaurants have TVs all over their walls with all sorts of advertising, the benches where you wait for buses are full of advertising something or other, the highways have advertising signs that spoil your enjoyment of nature, go to movie you pay for & you have to sit & watch that stupid white bear drinking that Coca-cola that is bad for your health & log on to Face-book & there you are..... more adds for junk you don't need. In the last few years there is a new form of advertising. In the city where I live, nearly all the trucks & cars that have any kind of business are driving around with large advertising signs telling us about their business with a phone number & their websites. It's like there is no more quality of life anymore. Every thing seems to be geared to get every last penny out of the gutless consumer one way or another. It seems everyone accepts this but do you? We talk about climate change & we hear that our land fills are getting full & we are sending our garbage over to Asia but still we shop until we drop, get ourselves up again & again shop until we drop. Have you ever thought that enough is enough when it comes to advertising? This is me talking to you. Me who cut the cable TV 16 years ago because he didn't like the demeaning advertising. What do you think? PS: Don't mean to rant & rave so much but most people in the know call the overload of advertising signs Visual Pollution. There is, of course, noise pollution that we often complaint about in some of the stores/restaurants but visual pollution in cities is a problem because it could conflict with safe driving.
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