So why are big corporations who sell products to people of all walks of life (and political views) trying to take a political position in their advertising?
I guess it's seen as the cool and hip thing to do, but to me it just comes off as pandering, and not just because it's being done from the left. I've always hated right-leaning pandering, as well.
In early April, Pepsi thought it was putting out a deep and soon-to-be-legendary ad featuring Kendall Jenner leaving a modeling shoot to join a pseudo-Black-Lives-Matter protest. At the crinegworthy end, she shares a Pepsi with a white, stone-faced cop, he smiles, and everyone cheers.
You could feel the arrogance of the producers coming through the screen. They really though they were making something cool, thought-provoking, socially aware, and uplifting. It's amazing that someone didn't step in at some point and raise the issue of how ridiculous it was -- especially the ending.
This commercial was indeed legendary -- legendarily tone-deaf -- as it accomplished the tough task of pissing off both the left AND the right.
The left found it to be offensive because it co-opted the Black Lives Matter movement to sell soft drinks, and then implied that complex race relation and police brutality issues could be solved with a can of Pepsi. Some even accused Pepsi of making the protest "look like Coachella", and that they were trying to portray resistance movements as the new cool place to be, rather than a serious fight against wrongs.
The right found it to be a glorification of the often violent and disruptive left-wing protest groups (whereas the group in the commerical was portrayed as docile, cool, and non-threatening), along with an obvious case of race-baiting. Every single police officer depicted was white, while most of the protesters were people of color.
Even Martin Luther King Jr's daughter hated it.
https://twitter.com/twt/status/849656699464056832
Pepsi quickly pulled the ad and apologized.
https://twitter.com/twt/status/849711408770158594
So was that it for politicized ads?
Not even close.
About a week ago, Heinken released this 4.5 minute ad, which shows a supposed social experiment of placing two strangers together with opposite political views, letting them work together building something, and then showing both of them (while standing together) videos of the other expressing their political viewpoints. At that point, they are given the option to either "discuss it over a beer" or to simply leave.
One of the right-wing guys pretends to leave the very passable transgender woman he had been working with (whom he had believed up until then was a regular woman), but then comes back and laughs that he was just kidding. Then it depicts all three pairs of people talking things out. By the end, everyone gets along, and the guy who pretended to leave even asks for the transgender woman's phone number, and even notes that he will "have to explain to my girlfriend why I'm texting another girl", indicating that he not only wants to befriend this transgender person, but also sees her as female (after stating the opposite in a video just hours earlier).
Heineken insists that this was an actual "experiment", and the people featured are not actors.
Unlike the Pepsi fiasco, this one was extremely well-received by the left.
Well, of course it was.
It shows right-wingers changing their minds to agree with the left-wingers, but not vice-versa. The left promotes this ad as an example of how people should just talk out their political differences calmly and understand one another. I agree that would have been a great message, but that's not the actual message here. The real message is that conservatives are not necessarily all bad people -- many are just a product of their upbringing.
Therefore, a friendly conversation between a conservative and a a leftist will break the spell, show conservatives how wrongheaded they are, and they will instantly become tolerant and understanding like those on the left are!
In short, it's telling the left that they're the correct ones, and they just need to approach conservatives in a more friendly manner in order to convert them.
I also don't believe the commercial features a real "experiment". These very much look like actors. Too many dramatic moments and perfectly dramatic pauses. All speech is clear, well-paced, and understandable -- no "ummms", mumbling, or fast-talking. Also, I don't buy the ending. It's understandable that a guy who thinks there's "only two genders" and doesn't accept trans people would be friendly to a trans person he got to know before realizing she was trans. However, it's unlikely he would ask for her phone number at the end, and then even mention that he will have to tell his girlfriend that he's "texting with another girl" -- thereby giving Heineken the perfect ending to the commercial showing how much he came around. It's also very convenient that the feminist wore a "Smash the Patriarchy" shirt to her video (but not to the experiment), and the shirt looked brand new.
I'd be shocked if this wasn't completely staged.
Finally, while the commercial focuses most on transgender acceptance, it depicts a very passable transgender woman who actually fooled the man working with her until the video came on screen. This is not common. Most male-to-female transgenders are not very passable, and are quite obvious when you see them. Even the ones who look female often suffer the problem of a deep male voice (think Caitlin Jenner), and this is something very difficult to correct through surgery or hormones. So of course they depict the right-wing guy quickly accepting the transgender woman as female, because it's very easy for the audience to accept, as well. If he was accepting a burly-looking dude in a dress with a deep voice as female, the viewer might feel creeped out and uncomfortable, but here we can all feel warm and fuzzy.
Why do people enjoy being pandered to?
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Originally Posted by sonatine
