The media broadcasts commercial or technological information, often irrelevant in helping us to make the best choice, and provides no real information on the quality of use or environmental impact. The media’s major sources of information come from advertising. This is how they come to participate in the “consumer society”.
The abundance of media channels, “new” information technology, the Internet, smartphones, email, blogs, social networks, commercials, etc. are nothing more than “tips” with poor information to choose from. The media has tremendous powers to misinform. It is very easy to do this – the media can easily use reports to find biased opinions or points of view.
“To disinform” is to knowingly communicate false information with intent to mislead. Misinformation is a method of communication process that uses the media to convey half-true information in order to deceive or influence public opinion to move it in a certain direction. This can be used as a method of manipulating consumers.
In the case of propaganda put out by a multinational lobby, the misinformation is inconspicuous, discreet and prepared. Groups like this may collude with the media, depending on their degree of independence or competence. This flow of advertising materials via the media, combined with entertainment, serves to make consumers – to put it bluntly – stupid. They end up wasting a lot of time on the Internet.
Hype and unnecessary information is a kind of drug and can be seen as a kind of poison. The media needs to bombard its audience in order to earn advertising revenue.
Consumers may one day need to reassess their own opinions or cleanse their thoughts. The media now employs journalists who have become entertainers. Media outlets give the illusion of offering a wide range of information via billboards, movies, newspapers, radio, TV and now the Internet. A society of spectacle is not only defined by the quantity of images and messages, but also by merchandising.
These gigantic media campaigns lead to a domination of the brand’s value over the value of use that makes the exchanges marketable. The media participates in the economic logic of consuming: it is a re-formatting of the brain. Of course, advertising does not bite the hands of those that feed it.
In this illusion, customers confuse the real with its media representation. They try to make us consume everything we possibly can: using TV ads, fashion, radio ads and so on.
Social media is changing the thought process by which we choose, buy and ultimately consume. Consumers turn to advertising tools, but with a more virtuous image. Information that is too commercial creates more trouble. The messages, or rather the content, the discussions contained in them, do not bludgeon consumers like advertising does. They create spaces for personal evaluations and opinions of products.
If the use of social media allows for an unparalleled power of communication, it hides the silliness and misery of this information despite its persuasive, often irresistible, quality. The reach of social media is still quite valuable when choosing products, despite the distrust it invokes.
The way the press interacts with usages is through inventing. The judgments and opinions of journalists on the quality of the products are not made rigorously and the so-called “free” press is ultimately paid for by advertising (billed at the equivalent of the cost of a 30-second TV spot).
Whether newspapers, weeklies, monthly news or entertainment media, scientific publications, or specialized or general outlets, the press and media seldom process information about products, and when they do it is only derisively or in any case inconsistently.
Magazines, which are more luxurious and more often marketed towards women, are only able to survive through flashy advertisements. Thus, they establish and update the lists of all the best products and amenities to discover and own, and even the opinions of celebrities to consult with.
The print and broadcast media are dominated by reverential journalism, by industrial and financial groups, by market thinking and by networks of complicity and collusion. The “decorative” press is developing widely in readers as well as in advertising pages. This is because consumers are looking for images. Repetitive information multiplies with the spokespeople, the unearned notoriety and the reciprocation of services. A small group of journalists whose power is strengthened by ignorance imposes its information on the public. Journalists often copy companies’ press releases. They are the guard dogs of the current economic systems.
It is too bad that publications like Le Canard Enchaîné1, which do not accept any advertising and avoid the influence of advertisers, do not publish any critical product information. They already know about the harmful effects of advertising. In refusing to give in to the “advertising fever”, they could teach us about better financial health, by being concerned about better qualities of products. Newspapers also participate in a vast acculturation process on product use and cultural standardization.
Advertising aims to “make things public” or to “make things known”. But advertising rhetoric, which is not reliant on the product’s quality, cannot inform choice as it is instead “trying to sell”. Advertising has no informative content, it only conveys illusions. It does not matter if the product is “good” or “bad”, its goal is simply to prop it up with a nice-looking image!
It is difficult to take your eyes off the screen during ads. Short interspersed scenes grab your attention with slogans like “Believe your eyes” or “As seen on TV”.
The indoctrination of advertising cultivates the consumerist system and feeds endless corruption. Refusing to consume would go against the way things are. Advertising is complicit in this perverse and vicious economic system, turning the consumption of essentially useless goods into a social model.
Advertising softens consumers’ alienation. We feel we must fit in with this so-called “world on the go”. It is all in the renewal of products and amenities. This hyperconsumption will become intolerable for the six billion consumers tormented by an “ecological” plan. They will not be able to live happy lives all the time any longer. This appetite and “bulimia” of the privileged squanders the resources of others. The qualitative must replace the quantitative.
Consumerism is egocentric. We must consume and then destroy what we have consumed. Thanks to the act of purchasing, to consume is to exist. Well-being through economic and technological development is a fantasy. The myth of technological progress is widely decried. Advertising is the fuel of the ideology that causes this damage: it incites us to constantly consume, blinding us all to the consequences of this hyperconsumption. It spreads a way of life that contributes to the impoverishment of life itself. Too often, the omnipresence of media advertising is met with a mixture of annoyance, fatalism and resignation.
The cost of such a bid is high: information based on the profit of private interests, TV that is anxious to “sell to the available attention span” and a press subject to advertisers’ requirements.
Major advertising agencies worth billions have made it a financial powerhouse; its communication advisers, a political power; its influence on the press, a media power. Much more than a superficial emanation of the economic order, the “ad” is an essential cog in the wheel.
Advertising may cause dissatisfaction, emptiness, a dependence on desires or even feelings of deprivation and frustration, especially among young people and the poor. It teases us, attracts us, and tries to take control of everything we want and all that seduces us, without teaching us how to appreciate what we already have.
The goal is also to comfort customers about their purchases, not just to convince potential consumers! You have to give them a good impression of what they bought, to reassure them (and not necessarily for specific reasons) so that they will persist in the purchases from this brand or store. Advertising confirms their opinions. Some consumers may believe this advertising, or at least pretend to. They often find an excuse or an easy justification to buy what they want anyway, regardless of advertising.
Due to its essentially commercial purpose, it is a particular form of propaganda, yet this term is prohibited. Although this word was once used by now-disgraced political regimes, the language of advertising clearly uses the same means: it uses laconic expressions, which are easy to memorize, leaving an impression on the viewer. It may even use fear in order to generate more receptive attitudes. In any case, it masks the disadvantages of products by sticking to the use of vague terms and fantasy. It gives free rein to vague ideas of quality, even to persuasions, promises, all of which are ultimately illusions.
Its arguments are eloquent, but not accurate. It tricks consumers, persuades them, makes them adhere to values, integrates them into the so-called consumer society; in short, advertising, as propaganda also teaches lessons. It wants for the consumers to believe that the Moon is made of green cheese, thereby re-formatting their brains.
Its power of conviction is remarkable. It harasses people constantly to penetrate their minds. The power of advertising, as the only apparent supposed channel of information, tells us what to think is right. The only things seen in the messages are positive, indisputable, affirmative and advantageous aspects. Advertising attempts to convince us of something in a very short amount of time. It must also stand out among all of the other commercials.
Its purpose is to convey an idea about the product. It must lead the potential customer to see in the product, and even more so in the brand, an exciting promise of satisfaction. Advertising does everything to convince, seduce and flatter, while all the while deceiving. It focuses on feelings rather than reason, playing on consumers’ emotional sides rather than their reflective sides. It uses convincing demonstrations, for example, in teleshopping. A “live” image seems more authentic and has great power of conviction.
Advertising oversimplifies the complex and sometimes tedious choice of buying, after consumers have endured thousands of rehashes of the same spot. The consumer does not, of course, have the time or means to make in-depth comparative studies of all competing products before buying, so advertising makes it easy and simplifies this delicate task.
However, advertising does not have the right to decide for consumers, to tell them which products are needed. It has not only invaded consumers’ privacy, but also manipulates politicians.
An image of assertion means to show value to the target of the ad. In the current economic system, it is thus a matter of leading a consumer to the act of a purchase. The critical purpose of advertising is a collective incentive to purchase.
Constantly pushing for consumption, advertising, through its omnipresence, plays a determining role. It messes with our reason by incessantly inciting temptations.
Advertisements can actually divert customers from the real questions of their choice by showing easy solutions. They put forward mythical visions of happiness, easily attainable, simply through the acquisition of such a “trendy” object. Effortlessly, using images of sexy women and arrogant men, always young and exuding confidence, it creates envy in the viewer.
TV ads are a tool for manipulation and ultimately of alienation, with their broad diffusion and their invaluable influence. They annihilate judgment by engendering conditioned reactions to each purchase. Emotion chases away all critical thinking and discernment. It is no longer about watching TV and ignoring the visuals. The consumers are no longer only in a society of images, but a society of visuals which influence them. Visuals are the tools of advertisers in consumerist ideology.
The products are recognized as possessing “quality” through the simple fact that their image embodies the dream created by advertising. Does the message not replace the product? The product is confused with its image, which advertising tries to signify to us. By easing concerns about the use of products, advertising is only about the happiness of consumers, often treating them as nouveau riche or reasonably well-off and economical (such as with the image of the good, caring and attentive father), and good environmental stewards. For their part, the consumers want to be “pampered” and want to believe in this happiness.
Advertising manipulates consumers’ buying decisions through diversion, by lying or by creating confusion. All this media pressure works well and is abundant with radio, television, press and now the Internet. All ethical, ecological, sustainable development and fashion principles are beneficial, provided that they motivate the right purchase. Solidarity and patriotism (such as “Made in France” labels) are also beneficial.
Advertising seeks to convey affection to arouse interest in the consumers, to interest and seduce them, and therefore advertising often entertains with humor. Yet a serious argument which borders on being boring can also sometimes be hard-hitting.
Brands also play this game, often with catchy characters. For example, hungry enzymes represented by small heads with large mouths, devouring clumps of dirt!
A negative approach can also work. This can include, among other things, making parents feel guilty so that they buy the best, most expensive products for their children.
Some strategies used in advertising are:
And, these days, they may utilize neuroscience to make a mark on our consciousness.
The process of choosing a product not only comes from the neural activities of neurophysiological analysis. The practice of psychotherapy, which is very similar to manipulation, tries to have its way. Advertising is now trying to appeal to neurobiologists to develop neuromarketing. Brain imaging may explain purchasing decisions.
Scientists and neuroimaging technicians predict that they will be able to detect auditory, visual or olfactory cues which trigger desires2.
Advertising is not made to make known, but to make believe. It attracts with false, deceptive or misleading information. The only difference between misleading and non-misleading advertising is in its scale. Advertising will never be rid of its lies. It is the economy of lying and the manipulation of irrelevant information for consumer choice.
It is a delusion to believe that we can reason with its exuberance. Its only goal is to avoid the most obvious lies, seeking out the more cajoling ones, softer but more insidious.
This being said, Article L. 121-1 of the French Consumer Code3 specifies:
“All advertising comprising, in any form whatsoever, representations, information or presentations which are false or likely to mislead, is prohibited, where the latter cover one or more of the items listed hereinafter: existence, nature, composition, substantial qualities, content in useful principles, species, origin, quantity, mode and date of manufacture, properties, price and terms of sale of goods or services which are the subject of advertising, conditions for their use, results which may be expected from their use, reasons for sale or service provision, sale or service provision procedures, scope of obligations undertaken by the advertiser, the identity, qualities or aptitude of the manufacturer, retailers, promoters or service providers.”
Advertising often uses deceptive language. It uses artificial, misleading, evocative, and manipulative expressions and slogans that do not provide any product information. The language of advertising conceals a lack of specific information. It masks unpleasant inconveniences while pretending to describe them. It hides the real unmentionable goods. It makes you adhere to an idea by giving the impression of being interested in the greatest number of possible concerns. It imposes an ideology or vision of certain qualities.
This deceptive language is characterized by a torrent of useless words to flood consumers with. It uses stereotypes expressed pompously with banalities and clichés. It traffics in repetition, superfluous and vague but easily memorizable expressions and banal phrases with invented words or those with pretentiously changed meanings. It manipulates public opinion using percentages without proof, whimsical polls and scientific expertise to give an appearance of authority, or testimonials from “Madame Everywoman” to make it “easier to understand”. To assume that advertising has an objective of selling is not always explicit.
Advertising insists that we fight back. It carves the name of a brand into the minds of consumers, while making them believe in certain aspects of the products. This “dumbing down” is an outright aggression. Consumers are subjected to constant advertising pressures on all the screens they look at, and now on the Internet. Insidiously, advertising inflicts its unscrupulous presence with ease and hegemony.
Children are also exposed to a large number of shimmering images, making them more credulous in the face of these tempting appearances. There is still an increase in the noise level of TV commercials in compared to the programs themselves which has remained this way, in spite of the rules imposed.
Consumers are glued to the screen while being completely exhausted. Essentially, intermixed sequences are linked together to maintain their attention, but without providing any information. These frequent cuts are detrimental to a consumer’s understanding. The advertising system is oppressive. Advertising continues to tighten its grip.
Advertising is also repetitive in order to maintain attention and make consumers memorize things.
Consumers do not remember the product, even after seeing the commercials: they go in one ear and out the other, as the expression goes.
It even says “unseen advertising”. It is like not hearing noise from the street.
Abusive, stubborn, advantageous and pernicious, these all describe ubiquitous advertising. But surges of ads cancel out at a saturation point: repeated spots lead to an indigestion of advertising, with their aggression and hype. If this was any other situation, if we were to receive the same message several times a day or week or month, and the repetitiveness of phone calls, would give viewers the right to file a harassment complaint! After being wrung dry by an overdose of advertising, constantly hassled by commercials, the consumers only retain one message: “I want your money!”
Many billboards mark their territory the way certain animals do, are illegal and serve to “Americanize” towns and even small villages. This visual and environmental pollution is almost as severe as the mental pollution they cause. They invade public space and daily life.
Since advertising has little time to make an argument, ads tend to rely on clichés and summarily false ideas. So it repeats and repeats! And repeats! Dumbing everyone down in the process!
How far will this hype go? In France, more than 20 million euros are invested per year in advertising 30 times more than the budget of the Ministry of the Environment! What’s so convincing about spending so much money and talent? The advertising system is essential for the development of consumerism and economic growth, whose consequences can become catastrophic for both humans and nature.
Advertising, which is becoming more and more globalized and identical in nearly every country, has generated a popularization of desires. Everyone is watching the same ads. Advertising is pernicious because it creates standardization. The aesthetic influence of TV supports these advertisements. The individual is no longer than a marketing demographic.
Advertising is far from guaranteeing the knowledge of the real qualities of these products, despite the illusory nature of editorial advertising, “informative” advertising, press releases, etc.
In any case, advertisers are not familiar with the products it sells (like manufacturers and distributors elsewhere). This is further proof of the collective ignorance of the qualities of use of the products!
For the company, advertising is a component of marketing. It is often harder to sell than to produce! Advertising speeds up the sale of new products or the discovery of innovations. It targets purchases and redemptions, e.g. to change cars, which, seen from an industrial point of view, will increase production. This whole mess comes with a “breaking bonus”. For the company, the economic interest is therefore not repairing products, but replacing them. Some manufacturers prefer to exchange the product rather than to run an after-sales service. Cars are repaired less and less often; instead people tend to replace the entire vehicle. Printers, cell phones, computers, almost new or barely used, are simply thrown away.
Advertising must not be given undeniable hope for the success of a business. This is only a factor of accelerating the diffusion of a product. Is it essential, however, a point of passage without which innovation would remain ignored? The discovery of products is done anyway without flashy advertising through the means of mass communications, advice from neighbors or friends. The importance of the means of advertising put into the dissemination of an innovation is even greater than the innovation is weak. An important and “useful” innovation is supported by free self-advertising. A small innovation is required to “raise its voice”. If it has nothing to say, it has to be rehashed!
Innovation does not need handsomely paid messengers or fanfare that only serves to dumb down, to grab the attention of consumers. “Necessary” and “unavoidable” expenses should focus more on the true purpose of the message: the product. The interests of advertising should be appreciated in the commercial results but the agency should resist any evaluation. Its effectiveness is never measured or verified.
How then can the effects of advertising communications be isolated from that of other factors that contribute to sales, brand awareness, image, etc.? Between the industrialists and the consumers (with the real users being ignored), this powerful institution is doing well with the media (it pays for them to survive). The advertiser works for the producer, of course, not for the consumers who pay for it regardless.
Is a huge commercial success real when we have to put in play a lot of expensive strategic means? If only a small part of these “advertising costs” were invested in product design, could it not be spared gigantic advertising resources, or with the same commercial support, obtain a greater success? Advertising gives businesses the edge over consumers, who receive this doctored information passively, without asking, which proves interests and tastes.
If advertising seems justified for manufacturers, subject to the laws of competition, it is less so for consumers, because the economic utility of advertising is questionable. For the country’s economy, the economic balance is almost non-existent, except that the sector employs a lot of people.
But advertising encourages waste and contributes to pollution. Advertising is thus just another factor of market distribution. The competition between several brands belonging to the same group does not serve the economic interests of the country either. Nor can it be argued that the direct effect of advertising is to support aggregate demand. Its covert yet formidable roles and its economic weight also translate into a certain social cost that is difficult to evaluate.
So long as the economic machine, captivating and vicious, does not forget its old principle: “consume (or rather buy) more to produce more”, there will be a lot of waste created by all – encouraged and supported by advertising. It should be noted that no political party dares to envisage a project of banning or even so much as restricting advertising.
Without genuine information other than sales, the purchased product may be of poor quality or simply unsuitable for the intended use.
The consumer is faced with difficulties of use, of understanding of the product’s assembly, etc. It is generally preferable to leave it as it is at the bottom of the cupboard rather than move it or to send it back.
In France, television is the leader of the advertising market, taking in several billions of euros per year! This is the main source of income for television. Large sports companies, for example, spend twice as much money on their image as on the wages for their hundreds of thousands of workers.
Advertising benefits large groups to the detriment of small producers. It thus contributes to the concentration of markets, favoring major brands and crushing competition. However sensitive to the variations of this situation, the advertising market is steadily expanding. The overall advertising revenue spent in France is €500 per year.
As an indicator, the price of one 30 second TV spot, depending on the channel, the schedule, the audience, the period, etc. ranges from €16,000 to €100,000 and it is the dictatorship of ratings that determines costs: the price of an ad slot has been set at €357,0004 for the final World Cup match!
The largest advertising revenues are spent on the football fields, detergents, hygiene, perfumery, cars and household equipment, computers and cell phones. What’s more, the authorized advertising time per hour in France is between 6 and 12 minutes depending on the type of channel.
The big advertising agencies have the means to pay their management well: according to a study by the consulting firm, Spencer Stuart, on French companies from the CAC 40, it appears that Maurice Lévy from the Publicis Groupe (an advertising and public relations company) is the highest paid executive in the CAC 40, with an annual salary of 4.5 million euros5.
The idea of publicity that is “free” is a hidden lie that appears constantly in advertising and in advertising campaigns, on packaging, with the offer of a gift, a second product for free, or a pen or some other gadget, but companies are not philanthropists. To accept something for free is to take the risk of paying for something later that may not be useful. Sweepstakes or competitions are also an incentive to purchase. Stuffed ad pages in the press make it easy to understand that it is advertising that pays these newspapers. This is the case for most of the press and especially the “free” print media (advertising costs around €160,000 per page). So how can it be stopped? It has existed since 1845 when Emile Dujardin created “cheap” newspapers, thanks to advertising.
Advertising can be dazzling, especially for children, who are easily captivated by it. They memorize slogans by repeating them as leitmotifs or jingles. The use of extraordinary clichés that appeal to purity, quality, ease and “beauty” allows them to evade any critical analysis.
Advertising seeks to convince its viewers through a nice-looking image. The products are then perceived as being of “high quality”, wonderful, by the simple fact that they embody this dream and they spend money on TV. It shows joy, well-being, satisfaction, and the excitement that the new product is perceived to provide. Our desires are tickled by the emotions the new products are supposed to arouse in us.
Consumers are manipulated with these enormous means of advertising, which are often misleading and even abusive. Mental manipulation techniques help us to control the conscience and generate enthusiasm.
Customers buy things in order to forget that they are, above all, the users. It is about pushing the purchase by communicating false certainties, always positive behaviors and with emotions at the expense of personal understanding, reasoning and judgment.
The over-abundance of commercials can persuade children that everything is easy to consume, and that cravings can only be appeased by consuming: once again, “to live is to consume”. To live is to follow a lifestyle corresponding to that of a group, a style which is deviously conditioned by advertising. These methods of mental manipulation lead to a servile nature, a passivity of the minds and in the behaviors of consumers.
This art of persuasion and imaginary influence makes it possible to reject the critical faculties, of judgment or the capacity to refuse this information. Advertising diverts real questions about a person’s quality of life. It short-circuits reflection. This manipulation is based on emotion: tenderness, fear, sentiments, feelings, spiritual pressure and pre-emptive changes of information, using verbiage and sophisms and so on.
It feeds on aberrations, absurdities, misinterpretations, errors, inaccuracies, nonsense, in short, illusions, and as a result, the consumer cannot distance themself from what they see on the screen. This imitation effect can be dangerous: fashion shows with overly skinny models have led many teenagers to anorexia.
The false rigor of the arguments manages to mislead consumers indifferent to, or unfamiliar with, a product’s real quality of use and appearance. The average person believes that they are not influenced by advertising and that they know all the tricks of advertising. However, it is more difficult than it may seem to resist the force of the monstrous advertising manipulation.
The argumentation is therefore different from the proof of the accuracy of the statements derived from deductive reasoning. It should not be considered as manipulation, where one tries to distort reality to influence the consumer.
Images and emotions replace actual demonstrations. Consumers become exhausted by being constantly worked up and excited by what they see in adverts, even if they have no immediate desire to purchase a product. This leads to saturation. “It’s better to consume” does not mean “consume more”.
Advertising visuals reveal a deliriousness and impoverishment of the imagination. The method is a diffuse and omnipotent ideology affecting beliefs, opinions and feelings, etc. It even sets standards and patterns of consumption.
Advertising makes us believe in a unique world of beauty and youth. It is often necessary to retouch the images or video clips in order to hide the evidence of old age. Physical beauty is also used in order to make the actor on screen or in the magazine look kinder. Seductive advertising also comes across through erotic representations, using games of sexual indicators.
To make the actors more beautiful, excellent makeup artists and especially good retouching artists are needed, as well as talented photographers and cameramen. This team of people work together in order to make the models look the most attractive and unique in the advertising world. Stereotypes like femininity, virility and childhood are all good chances to brand products almost as fetishes.
Sports are another great vehicle for advertising. With their positive image in the audience’s mind, they bring many values: well-being, dynamism, a competitive spirit, self-improvement, and also a team spirit and technical prowess. Advertising can take advantage of the impact in the media of major sporting events in order to be noticed by the public.
Sports heroes are an integral part of corporate branding and sports performance is usually part of a company’s communication policy. Sponsorship is also a fairly high portion of advertising spending.
Customers seek trust before buying. They look for benchmarks and recognized values which are shared by their role models. They do not want to worry too much about buying and instead would like to hear a product’s praise by a familiar and perceived-as-reliable source. Famous celebrities of world sports or entertainment are excellent examples of these trusted sources. Advertisement shows actors who are likely to have similar desires to their targeted audience, satisfied by this product.
Consumers will inevitably want what the celebrity has!
The socio-cultural role of advertising is not trivial at all. Advertising should not be responsible for our education. The socio-cultural role of advertising is less apparent than its supposed purpose of selling. It is certainly more formidable and more pernicious than its economic role. These “sorcerer apprentices” of advertising are not only economic intermediaries; they are cultural instruments. Advertising is at the heart of the organization of society. It acts as a cultural guide by making the industrial society into a consumer society.
Advertising is the main trap to ensure that we insert ourselves into the “technological system” by touting technical devices with a vocabulary of its own. Advertising can have the most unacceptable impact on the consumer.
To what kind of commercial and deceptive society does advertising seek to lead us? Advertising is taken in and accepted because it is ubiquitous. As if the accommodation exempts its continued presence. Advertising is not the only display but also the incentive of consumer society. It colludes with the phenomena of fashion and trends. It is one of the main servants of commerce and the economic system. It configures the behavior of the consumer, while including his favorite parts of everyday life. It is the guide, the mentor and the counselor. It reveals how to arrange and choose objects. It shapes good taste by illustrating it with charm. Finally, it is a leader of opinions. It encourages certain ideas or aesthetics. Its influence can have a pernicious effect! Advertising wants us to naively believe in a social and cultural arrangement. We cannot escape. It encourages a homogenization of use. All types of customers receive the same information. Advertising shapes consciences. It leads to a uniform world, while making you believe in diversification and individuality: with this or that product allowing a consumer to differentiate themselves. Advertising forces us to look at “pre-chewed” images. Consumption is a pure matter of the manipulation of signs.
Advertisers revel in sublime inspirations. They presume to take part in the improvement of everyday life, particularly in the fields of art and “design” (the adjective they managed to invent by diverting the meaning of the activity of design). However, their participation in culture is particularly illusory. There is no doubt that graphic arts have given a lot to the advertising profession. The innovative capacity and the talent of creative types, photographers and filmmakers are not tarnished in this process. Advertisements can include excellent photos, drawings, slogans, illustrations and humor. But the disadvantage of advertising is also the waste of the know-how of its designers and creative geniuses. We devote millions of euros and the efforts of some of our most talented minds to devise slogans, most of which are poor and pathetic. This argument for artistic value, a recurring theme of advertisers, does not hold up.
Advertising makes us forget the reality of a consumer’s everyday life. It gives us a culture of illusion. The message replaces the training. The circle is complete. Consumers are addicted. Looking at an ad, though, you do not consider your own life. The trend is the illusion of progress. To not be “trendy” is to not “be”. We must feed our eyes. Mimetic desires lead to owning the same products as others, to display our own success. It is necessary for consumers to be like everyone else, but at the same time individualistic, forging their own paths. Because not following other people is old-fashioned and outdated.
Advertising makes important things obscure in favor of all things futile and superficial. Advertising puts aside the real problems of use and environmental impact. These simplifications, with simple answers to complex problems, including the choice of a product, are excessive and deplorable.
Yet advertising is an art, a culture, a dream machine. In fact, it shapes consumer needs, conveys stereotypes and fuels the race toward productivism and consumerism.
Babies are hypnotized in front of the television, in the face of the never ending parade of commercial images! The commercials, which show children who are happy to own and benefit from projects, induce the temptation in the viewers (the children) to want the product as well. Young children are thus a receptive target. Television entertains them, amuses them, interests them, but it also gives them no relevant information. In any case, they do not perceive its commercial purpose until the age of 7–8 years old and do not differentiate between programs and commercials. Most of the time, they are faced with spots for “everyone” that are not adapted for their age, but made to be easy to remember and mimic. For them, it is a game. But a child is also a potential client or prescriber.
A child is easier to convince than an adult. It is the pleasure that persuades them. Once they laugh, the ad has won! They do not understand the purpose of the messages. They are often prescribers for store shelves, not hesitating to act on whims.
Many purchases made by “advised” parents are useless and lead to regrets. In the face of advertising, consumers are also reduced to children.
In the US, some video recorders can automatically detect TV ads, filter and delete them as desired. But these devices are still confidential in Europe, as a result of the very strong and obvious disarray of broadcasters. On the contrary, the installation of “anti-ad” ad blockers when using the Internet is still possible. But the complete removal of advertising on the Internet would be too difficult.
It is possible to refuse flyers in mailboxes with a simple sticker reading “anti-ad”, or “thank you for not placing advertising here” or “no advertising please”. Although there is no guarantee, these stickers do generally lesson the annual 40 kg intake per household of paperwork and leaflets (which in general are not read, are useless for information on products and are especially bad for the ecology).
Now it is also in our inboxes! And phones! And with SMS…!
There are some retaliation efforts, thankfully. A registration with the “Bloctel” service, accessible on the Internet, is supposed to limit unwanted and unbearable soliciting over the phone.
We exploit the digital culture and the ignorance of many consumers. The “free” services on the Web are a good, invisible way to track and file consumers in order to identify them and to know their desires, to make them “targets”. The obligation for any website to obtain the formal agreement of the consumer to create a cookie for advertising purposes is not always respected. It must be noted that advertising on the Internet hinders navigation and is troubling because it uses personal data files. This is impacted by the fact that, in general, Internet users do not truly understand what a “cookie” is.
Online advertising is irritating because it is an intrusive announcement which suddenly appears on the screen. It wastes bandwidth and energy, which can cause connection problems in underserved communities. The network can often even become impractical with these advertising videos.
The addiction to tablets and mobile phones allows for a strong development of intrusive online advertising. Online advertising gives us the feeling of belonging to a group. This makes it possible to make more use of personal data which is collected at the slightest step of the user.
Online advertising traps Internet spaces, largely dominated by large sites and search engines. In order to be able to “target” consumers, the technique of stalking advertising offers services, participation in games, offers or “free” gifts but in exchange for personal information. It tracks users through “cookies”. The Internet is then distorted into becoming a gigantic supply of personal and behavioral data, without protection for Internet users. They are subjected to continuous spying. This obviously also applies to social networks. Applications via browsers can protect against these risks, but their distribution remains rather obscure.
The personalization of advertising messages is the latest tool of behavioral marketing. Through surveys, market research and now “cookies”, sellers can have information on the behavior of consumers, their profiles, their desires, their choice criteria, etc. The ideology of communications requires them to be on social networks.
Advertisers make a personal relationship materialize into a business relationship. It is also becoming more and more targeted, thanks to the exploitation of personal data, taken for free from our Internet searches and our “likes”. It is a case of convincing the consumer to buy such and such a product which is, according to their algorithms, likely to correspond with their desires.
This personal data is now the center and source, including financially, of all business models of the digital economy. Internet users and any other computer-related systems unintentionally provide all the valuable data needed for brainwashing and corporate enrichment!
Comparative advertising is only allowed if it is concerned about the truth(!) It should only relate to objective elements, which reduce it to aspects of the price. For example, if information on the quality of use and the environment is not available.
In any case, comparative advertising could not be compared to anything, since ads are not made to be informative. Clandestine advertising and misleading advertising (now covered under the notion of misleading commercial practices) are, in principle, prohibited.
“The Autorité de régulation professionnelle de la publicité (ARPP – French professional regulation authority on advertising) is an inter-professional association created under the 1901 law which constitutes a private organization for the self-regulation of advertising in France. Established in 1935 as the Office de contrôle des annonces (Office of the control of announcements), the organization became the Bureau de vérification de publicité, BVP (French Advertising Verification Bureau) in 1953, before taking the name ARPP in June 2008. The BVP, founded by the “people of the trade” ensures the sincerity of advertising in all its forms and puts pressure on any one of its members to remove a given advertisement that does not demonstrate a sufficient level of truthfulness.
Its mission is to take action in favor of fair, truthful and healthy advertising for the benefit of advertising professionals, consumers and the public.
It must advise all advertising media (press, billboard, radio, Internet, cinema, television) before the insertion of an advertisement.
Each year, the BVP publishes a code of ethics for its advertisers and advertising professionals that specifically describes, depending on the areas concerned, the limits that should not be crossed. In this way, certain terms or concepts are therefore prohibited.
The BVP, with all its advertising players (agencies, advertisers, advertising media, professional unions), determines its ethics. It is comprised of self-disciplining rules that the profession places on itself voluntarily so that its advertising in France is exemplary, beyond the simple application of the laws which may already regulate it.”6
Its effectiveness has been called into question, both in terms of its verification as well as its regulation.
There are no serious issues and consequences on the product’s quality of use. Only a few documentaries, reports or surveys are broadcast, but without in-depth analysis. These are rather superficial, uncomplicated programs which are ultimately poor for the culture of choice, but are deemed interesting, often by their “whistle blower-like” nature. These are still the images that hold power, especially for advertising or the Internet.
This drifting of the product information benefits the form rather than the substance, ideas or knowledge. It appeals more to emotions or seductive appeals, or even amusement, rather than argumentation. As a distraction, for the sake of its audience, useful information for the choice is retracted.
Television diverts attention and contributes to unique ways of thinking. It is a good way for brands to evade criticism, judgment and even reasoning. It is the only spokesperson for advertising, marketing and often the misinterpretation of technology. It props up some journalists as “experts” and “attention generators”, who become stars, but are quickly forgotten.
With advertising, television is the expression and representation of the consumer society. All that goes in the direction of this kind of communication charms the consumers and takes away their critical spirit.
Television produces its programs primarily on the basis of audiences, sometimes to the detriment of “quality”. Contracts between television and production companies often contain audience clauses. This is an incentive to be seductive, to be pleasing above all else. The real qualities of the products are of little interest.
In some cases, television can also act as a babysitter. “It calms the kids down!”, people say. Many parents even believe that some programs are useful for the intellectual development of their children, without realizing the harmful effects that they have, which have been denounced by pediatricians! Their children may find the programs to be entertaining, but they are given a poor culture of choice.