I think the world would be a better place if there was no advertising. I happen to think that the advertising industry has become a powerful and negative force in our society. It has destroyed our news, for example, funding free until people are unwilling to pay, then flocking to Facebook and Google; making real journalism unaffordable and causing our current hellish descent into fake clickbait. It has eroded the ability of writers and musicians to make a living. It has permeated every public space: our buses, our hospitals, our parks, until there is barely anywhere we are not positioned as consumers. It stalks our every (online) move. It sells gender stereotypes and racial stereotypes and heteronormativity. It sells selfishness and greed and vanity. It sells eating disorders and bleached coral reefs, child labour and pointless plastic, obesity and disappointment. And advertising is clever. Because it takes youth culture and avant garde art and wild music and grassroots politics and literature and any real creativity that might threaten the current system and it tames them. It strips them of subversion then sells them back to us.
There’s been a lot of talk on social media about poets doing adverts. I only noticed really when I saw this poem by Luke Wright on Youtube criticising them. My immediate thought was that it’s a great poem, there are some lines that really made me laugh. (‘So what if Iggy sells insurance and Lydon sells us butter? / I preferred their early work, the greedy motherfuckers’) I also thought it was quite brave – he makes a living as a poet and has the profile to get approached for these things, so he is burning a few bridges here, drawing a line.
However, most people I saw online seemed to be annoyed with him. Like he touched some kind of nerve. Apparently adverts are good profile for poetry. And naturally poets need the money. Apparently, no one has a right to criticise. Fay Roberts defends those ‘feeling stung and belittled by the unsought judgement’. Sophie McKeand argues: ‘The world is becoming more and more judgmental and intolerant and it’s depressing to see that, at times, poets are leading the charge on this instead of focussing on things that really matter.’
Well I suppose it depends what you think matters.
I disagree with this assumption that ‘judging’ is inherently wrong, as though critical engagement is for meanies. Agreed, we all make compromises and we don’t know the poets’ financial situations. Lots of poets have day-jobs – they might run hedge-funds or work for Google and this is none of my business. But once you write a poem and perform publically then judgement is not ‘unsought’, even if you’re doing it for a large cheque. You’re putting it out there for people to judge, and not just your line-breaks either – your opinions, your motivations, your feelings. That’s what makes being a writer scary. It’s exposing.
I think the adverts under discussion contain some pretty poor poems. To be clear, I’m not condemning the poets generally, just these specific poems. George the Poet’s rhymes are used to suggest that individuality (which ‘doesn’t come off a production line’) can be purchased in the form of an expensive, environmentally unsound jeep off a production line, and urge the viewer to do various things which sound kinda cool but are totally empty (‘Defy your alibi’.) The Nationwide ads are strung together from soft-focus cliches (churning stomaches and melting hearts, knees-up and cuppas, dad dancing and hero’s welcomes) and reinforce, in the juxtaposition of poem and product, certain messages: that a building society lending money is doing you a ‘kindness’, or that house ownership is a necessary part of creating a family home.
So I don’t see these adverts and think ‘well at least they used real poets’. I don’t see anything better in them than any other jingle. And I think we’re allowed to question whether presenting these words to people as poetry actually does poetry any good.
In a statement Jim Thornton, VCCP deputy executive creative director of the Nationwide adverts, said: “Each of these poets brings a raw honesty to the words they have written, the subjects they’ve chosen and the way in which they are performed. It’s rare and refreshing to see such authenticity in a world of advertising artifice. Sometimes, advertising is at its most effective when the hand of the client and agency can be least detected.”
I find that last line faintly chilling. And do you see what he’s buying there? Honesty and authenticity. If that’s what he’s buying, then that’s what you’ve sold.
I think if artists want to endorse products they actually like and companies they believe in, that’s up to them. Also you may be missing the point that the Nationwide is an old-fashioned mutual building society. It has no shareholders creaming off the profits. It belongs to us,the members,and it has remained true to its founding ethos of brokering mutual help between savers and borrowers. I think that deserves a bit of celebration, including from poets.
Of course it’s up to individual poets what they endorse, Judi. But that doesn’t mean they’re then beyond criticism. They have the right to choose whether to do the advert, but not to blanket approval.
Judi – it’s one thing if the poets can honestly say they wanted to ‘celebrate’ the ethos of Nationwide and were thrilled at the opportunity to give their brand a boost. It’s quite another if Nationwide just happened to be the ones offering payment. Don’t you think?
I’m not sure that’s even the difference. If the poets weren’t getting paid and endorsed Nationwide or jeeps on mainsteam media there’s still a problem. An ethical organisation or NGO maybe, but not for profit anywhere in the mix. Even then, entering into the transaction of having the poetry processed into an ad smacks of narcissism. You don’t use poetry to sell stuff, period. Clare uses the right word – it’s chilling; it’s a sinister perversion of what the (manipulative) art of poetry is for. Which, as you know, is a pretty close definition of advertising.
I agree with you Clare: no one is above criticism when they make their work public and advertising is a scourge. We have the right to criticise or comment on anything in the public eye whether it is by ‘good guy’ poets/artists or the advertising industry and both together if they work with each other, rare as it is. I don’t think there’s an argument to be made of the ‘oh poets get no money they should take any opportunity’ type. It’s more an indictment of the fact poets can’t make money from selling books/performing.
Thanks for this article, Clare. Your comments about advertising are the main reason I’ve always paid a fee to WordPress to keep my personal blog and And Other Poems ad-free. Also, I think it’s worth mentioning that not all Nationwide members feel that their organisation is worth celebrating. https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/reject-obscene-executive-pay-at-nationwide-building-society . What I appreciate most about this post is that it’s given me the opportunity to talk more to my family and close friends about making ethical decisions.
At last, some clear thinking on the whole issue. The argument will continue but at least it has now been made clear that to comment is not to take up a personal position on any of the poets involved. Critical engagement means more than clicking a “like” button.
Great post, Clare. You’re right, Luke Wright’s right. No two ways.
Right under this blog post are two adverts. One for Dulux paint and one for Moo business materials. So is your blog ad funded?
Ha yes valid point!! This debate has made me think that maybe I should pay WordPress so the site can go ad-free. I never have because obviously the blog makes me no money, and I don’t want it to actually cost me, but given my loathing for advertising it would be nice to have my web page clear of it!
Is it okay if I dump some random, disparate observations in this comment section cos I don’t want to write my own blog? It goes without saying that I think that this blog is excellent. I can’t argue against the points you make about the insidiousness of advertising. They may not always be the originators of malignant ideas and iconography by they are always ready to harness them if it means making an extra buck.
Firstly, I think it’s helpful to differentiate between the Nationwide ads (which aren’t good, but are about as bad as your average commission) and the George the Poet Jeep ad which is an incontestable blaze of dogshit, morally and artistically. It really does anything to make anything better in the world apart from George’s bank (or mutually owned building society) balance. As far as I have seen, while some are defending George’s choice to take the money, no one is defending the ad or the poem. So, can we all agree that it is a blaze of dogshit and work from there to find more common ground?
I have seen a lot of people make the argument that Luke is a hypocrite because he’s performing the poem in a car with a baby seat in the background. This is as asinine as someone saying that Luke is a hypocrite for chewing some unidentified food while critiquing a MacDonalds advert. Luke doesn’t live in London, most people that don’t live in the great cities need a car. Child seats are a legal requirement for those who drive with children. His first collection brought out a few years back was called Mondeo Man, so he’s not exactly going against previous artistic practices (spoiler alert: the title poem isn’t about being a renegade).
I don’t think the divide between sides is a page/stage one as many are making out. I think it’s more generational. A recent documentary by Doug Rushkoff surveyed millennials and many of them didn’t understand what the term “selling out” meant ( https://soundcloud.com/brian-lehrer-show/douglas-rushkoff-on-how-kids ). While I’m sure those that are defending poems in ads know what this means, I think that, to paint with a broad brush, selling out is more of a Gen X concern than a millennial concern.
This probably has a lot to do with how the internet and social media have woven advertising more intricately around our social affairs and those that have grown up in this context don’t draw as sharp a dividing line between personal integrity and corporate collusion.
This is something I’ve also noticed when it comes down to whether people find the Oscars or Grammys relevant. Younger people voice their concern that Beyonce should have won an award instead of Adele and then a thirty/forty something butts in to say that all awards are trivial, corporate backslapping affairs.
I find that both sides have different values and are arguing at cross purposes. One generation sees corporate capitalism as the greatest divider between communities and social groups and must therefore be seen as the primary antagonist. The other generation sees representation of social groups and fringe art forms as the prime objective across the board.
So when a corporate entity raises the profile of someone from a disenfranchised social group, one group celebrates it as a victory for getting people and ideas that were previously underground “out there” – the other sees the corporate collusion as something that poisons the struggle of that social group.
So yes, as said above, what I take from this is a generational schism between groups with differing core values and missions. I hold up my hand to being one of those anti-corporate Gen X types. However, because my work keeps me in contact with millennials, I find trying to listen to and understand their concerns more valuable than winning arguments and being right about stuff all the time. It’s hard work but I’m trying.
Oh, by the way, I don’t see the ads under this blog because I’m using uBLock origin for chrome. I recommend it to anyone that doesn’t like advertising. So don’t go shelling out on my behalf at least.
” It really does anything to make anything better in the world apart from George’s bank (or mutually owned building society) balance. ”
Should be “In really does nothing to make anything better in the world” which makes a tiny bit more sense.
Hmmmmm: I get what you’re saying about the generation gap, Niall, but I’m not convinced: I think it’s a bit of a generalisation. I know plenty of GenX (and older) who don’t even question ads. Actually, judging by my teen kids, i think it’s the other way round: they are far more ad-literate and far less convinced about endorsements. Cynical. Maybe that would make them less fearful of it: I don’t know. It’s just as likely to be a difference of naiveté vs experience: to me, that’s what it feels like. When I was a copywriter in my 20s I was happy to write ads — even for McDonalds; yes — because you got to go on shoots in interesting places and it seemed edgy, exciting and glamorous. Now I run a mile: won’t listen to commercial radio, hate magazines, try to arrive late at the movies, don’t even have a TV. Partly because I sat in too many ad strategy meetings listening to how they were going to make people feel inadequate if they had a different product, and partly having kids of my own.
Maybe it also depends on demographics. Plus the poets who got hired to make the ads aren’t millenials, either: they’re the ones the jury’s out on.
I take your point about the difference between Nationwide and the jeep thing, but I still have real trouble with anyone using a poem — a piece of writing that should come from the heart, which is expressly written to talk straight to the emotions of someone else — to sell anything, however ethical you think the product is. It’s the Faustian compact: makes the poet sell themselves to endorse a brand which is faking a value to the consumer. That’s what a brand is. The company is not poetry, or even family: it will still have bosses earning more than underlings, shareholders, it has a huge advertising budget and can afford to hire an agency and shell out on colossal media spend. That’s not all fair money for the people: that’s a business right there, fair and square. That’s a business trying to disguise itself as a mate, as a genuine Joe from the street, as family, as honest. That’s repellent.
After propaganda (Edward Bernays) which was written 90 years back, you may know the next-best bible of manipulation and strategy is Vance Packard’s book Hidden Persuaders — the first post-war to blow a critical hole in how ads lie to consumers (why are we even called consumers, ffs?), and Barthes and co uncover the semiotics that persuade, all of which are carefully parsed & expensively researched in the making of an ad. Though the tactics are more covert nothing’s changed.
Look at this. This is how Campaign reports the Nationwide agency’s strategy:
>The first ad, which focuses on children’s savings, precedes two others also featuring poets. One will focus on investing in branches and people and the other will target first-time buyers.”It’s rare and refreshing to see such authenticity in a world of advertising artifice. Sometimes, advertising is at its most effective when the hand of the client and agency can be least detected.”< (authenticity/artifice, followed by the giveaway line: it has been 'strategised' within an inch of its life).
I agree it's not about blaming the poets, bullying or blackballing anyone. It's just depressing, really, about advertising spreading its ugly claws so wide.