Re: Commercialism and art

Brandon Van every (vanevery@rbdc.rbdc.com)
Sat, 9 Sep 95 03:31 EDT

>I've also noticed an upswing of "military" advertizing, where a
>product is associated with troops blowing bugles and such. Another
>sign of the conservative times.

Are they selling notion of the 'strong, proud country', ready to defend
itself agains (fill in favorite enemy here)agression?

No, nothing that overt. The military is portrayed as a sort of
comical place with people yelling a lot and blowing a lot of bugles.
Then people get pushed out of transport planes carrying bags of
pretzels. "Bombs away, pretzel boy." But the mere fact that the
military is put in such a positive light, is definitely a sign of
conservativism.

>I'm sorry, I just have to ask... forgive me, this has been a running
>gag in my house for the last 15 years.
>
>What do you think of Mrs. Olson? You know, Folger's coffee, back in
>the 70's? Or did you never see it... USA advertizers might not have
>been stupid enough to show such a thing in Norway, but that would be
>giving them a _huge_ benefit of the doubt. :-)
>
>Norway! That sparkling land of coffee....

I haven't heard of it, nor seen it, or even heard of Folger's coffee.
You'll have to explain this to me.

Probably better not! I bet you didn't know that Norway was co-opted
in the 70's as a land of people very wise in the ways of coffee. Much
like Juan Valdez is co-opted for Columbia right now. At least
Columbia actually _makes_ coffee....

You might not know that TV commercials are a new thing in Norway, we've
only had it for about 5 years. Even now, the commercials are _between_
shows, never in them. Social-democracy has it definitive brigth moments.

WOW. As Johnny Carson would say, "I did not know that."

Cheers,
Brandon