Drawing The Line Somewhere

When you work in advertising, people tend to ask you where you draw the line. As in, what’s the brand or brands you would refuse to work on. Most industry people stick to the same script. Tobacco, pharmaceuticals, and the military industrial complex. When it comes to moral objections, I’m not like everyone else. Over the years, I’ve kept a long-running, ever-growing list of brands that give me pause or some semblance of concern. 

For instance, I’d work for a junta, but not a cabal. A junta does their business out in the open, while cabals meet in secret, sometimes literally in the shadows. While I enjoy getting out of the sun as much as most pale writers, it can be hard on the eyes to squint that much. All that smoke and glow from a row of computer screens is incredibly uncomfortable. With a junta, you know where you stand, which is usually in a poorly dug foxhole. Plus, it can be pretty steady work, as long as the guerrillas are committed to a policy of mutally assured destruction. Reelection campaigns in totalitarian states are far less taxing (for marketers) than those in democracies. You don’t have to waste your time on attack ads or going negative. 

I don’t think I could bring myself to write a commercial about a gun. But I could easily write them about knives, missles, maces, spears, swords, battle axes, and really long sticks used to swat at people. If I’m feeling exceptionally confident, I might even ask the junta if they have any recommendations for firearm alternatives. Honestly, there is a scenario in which I could write an ad about bullets. Divorce them from their notorious delivery system, and instead picture them in necklace form. Much cheaper and sturdier than pearls

I can’t imagine ever working directly for a religious sect. Too stuffy and old-fashioned. As a rule, they are rarely open to to rebranding. But a cult? That’s a different story. Cults are very conscious of the moment. But not just that. They’re also concerned with how they’ll be perceived a hundred, maybe a thousand years from now. 

You have to draw the line somewhere. And when you do, it should be done in grease pencil, hunched over a drafting table in a fortified safe house. But hey, that's just me.