Politics is no longer “fun” anymore.  When people threaten your life and your families life over a throw away social media post (I will now save my rants for Twitter,) it changes the way one(me) see the world and the dangers of that world.

Mar 3, 2017 Time Magazine’s Seth Matlins wrote that It’s a Time for Every Brand to Pick a Side.  Matlins used a statistic that 74% of brands (could) disappear right now and no one would care.  The 26% of what he calls the “living brands” are winning the battle of attention by letting people know whose side they are on.

As ad legend Bill Bernbach said, “If you stand for something, you will always find some people for you and some against you. If you stand for nothing, you will find nobody against you, and nobody for you.” This is our new marketing reality, and cultural values are marketing’s new table stakes . Few are the brands who court controversy as a matter of strategy. But in today’s landscape, avoiding taking sides and bringing your cultural values to life to avoid controversy is a fast track to irrelevance.

While I am no ad legend like Bill Bernbach (love that household name) I do not think that retail locations and restaurants need to identify their stand on controversial topics.  When Starbucks took a stand for raising awareness for refugees, the right quickly got active with#BoycottStarbucks.  When Pepsi jammed the square peg into the round hole by solving the Police v. Black Lives Matter (with Kendall Jenner’s little blue can,) well the left and right laughed at the patronizingly fake stand.  Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A have identified their causes on the right by taking a stand.  All it does is create haters.  A brand is only as strong as the top of mind awareness created from that brand’s message.

If you serve food do you really need your customers to know your political feelings?  Is not it better to answer the customer’s need for hunger, than lecture that customer about the “ills of the world?”  Does your cleaning product only work for conservatives and not liberals?  Do only conservatives get dirty?

We are living in really weird times.  We need a thriving economy and the last thing we need right now is for Coke, Pepsi, or Budweiser to use their content to divide or even try to heal.  Advertising needs to be topical and timely, but not preachy.  Poke Fun, Have Fun, but don’t lecture.

UPDATE: http://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/4as-survey-finds-more-risk-than-benefit-in-brands-tackling-political-and-social-issues/

My daughter said, don’t feed the trolls.  Boy, was she right.  On Sunday, May 21^st I posted my first TRUMP complaint which I took down after the discussion became threatening.  Much to my surprise I woke up to the phone text via Facebook messenger this morning that I answered, but then as I dived more into the writing, I reported the following (below)to Facebook.  I knew I would get a discussion going that was spirited, but I never thought I would be threatened.  To cause terror is to threaten.  I was threatened.  So, I am posting this as a message that terrorism can come in many forms.  You are going to read accusations that hold zero validity.  I never disparaged Vets nor did I disparage Mike’s son.  The reason the original post was removed was that I was scared of the hatred (as follows) spewed towards me and my family.

Background on my post.

My opinion (as posted) was generally disappointment in the way the President cozied up to the Saudi Royals, my disappointment that the President has embraced dictators, and my reasoning for voting for Donald Trump was that he campaigned as a non interventionist.  Where Mike’s hate came from is anyone’s guess.  For the record, I do not worship Satan.  I never put down Jesus, why would I do that????  Finally, I don’t hate Donald Trump.  I don’t like him, but if we cannot criticize our leaders, well, we become our enemies.

If you ever put my son down again for defending Christians and Jews I’m going to knock your front teeth on the back your throat when I see you

So you take that to your lawyer and I will show that you are a Muslim sympathizer and a devil worshiper

F*** you for putting them contractors f*** you for putting down the American Military f*** you for putting down Jesus you are wet brain with this piece of s*** you are no better than Muslims

I told you this was going to happen but you fear Trump more than terrorist… your words not mine you f****** idiot

I will be getting rid of you and put you on a CIA watch list period period period you f*** with the wrong American m***********

Michael H

Anything that you post from this internet will show that you are colluding with the Enemy period period period I gave you a chance but you were too dumb to realize the truth of Jesus. But I’m sure your stance will be run away from the Middle East because the problem will just go away. People like you prolong a very serious problem for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren period period period I know your name from high school other than that we were never friends you are just an acquaintance that I graduated with

Michael H

YouTube I can say one thing for sure you are a traitor to America and its Constitution and to God Almighty which is not Allahabad you liberal communist douche

On your gravestone say.. Manchester… you never give a f*** about them because you allowed them into Live Nation as you would love them into our nation

Michael H

Say something you soulless fuckhole! You put down my son and you support Satan. You were told a long time ago. But you support Lucifer… That’s why you make excuses for Islam

Michael H

It’s just good to know that your family supports the enemy and that my family will be able to track your family in regards to your anti-American bullahit. You don’t fear Islam but you fear Trump? You’re a f****** joke Scott and personally any child you ever produced will not produce again

Michael H

And just so you don’t try and make me out to be a bad guy when I say produce I mean your liberal f****** nonsense of the world is just going to get along fine with Islam running rampant… great day with Islam in England was it today I warned you I told you Islam will strike everywhere in this world till the day you die and f****** like you will allow it you are this disgusting doing things

Michael H

Have a happy day Scott with your hatred towards Trump and not Islam

But you’re crazy enough to say the terrorist attack happened because of trump

Muslim terrorist supporters are Scott McCandless … you’re the one who said it …not me

You didnt stop Trump from the terrorist attack in England

You fear Trump exclamation point but you don’t fear terrorist. Are you finally reading your words you worthless white f***

Michael H

Scott … I truly believe your family are terrorists from England from 1970s and so is your family will no longer be defended by Americans.. You put that on my son you put down what he does for a living as a contractor and as a soldier I say f*** you

You are a Godless soulless turd! I can’t wait to meet you face to face

5:56AM

Michael H

You better wake up you gotta solace fuckle you said you don’t fear terrorism so can you please explain to him to stop blowing up innocent people in England and it’s going to soon be in the United States you’re a f****** retard… you created this deaths in England because of your vanity

Michael H

Please tell me again how Trump is bad for the world

---

I hated High School and this was a giant reminder of why!  When the President of our country inspires people to threaten others based on their opinion we are in trouble.

Fake Outrage is all the rage.  What I mean, the left and the right are manufacturing outrage just to outdo each other in a “trashing talkin’ hate war.”  Think about it, there are two opposing sides in the aftermath of the recent election of the Presidency of the U.S.A.  I will call the sides positive and negative.  Friends and families fight over positive or negative.  Our influential celebrities that include comedians, sports figures, and actors have taken sides and their fans have been reinforced or rejected.  It is sad that a year ago, in a less divided country Jimmy Kimmel, Bill Maher, and Stephen Colbert made our positive and negative teams laugh together.

 

Taking sides is what human beings do.  Whether it is English Soccer or NFL American Football, trash talking has become the norm in between fans of those sports.  I always viewed politics as a blood sport but I never imagined that the recent election would take the country into two tribes, as I mentioned I am calling them positive and negative.  Maybe Mark Burnett creator of the longest running reality show Survivor, taught us how to take sides.  Burnett first taught us how to act in a tribe.  To survive in a tribe one had to be cunning, or hard working.  When one’s time was done, “the tribe had spoken.”  Burnett also taught us one had to be unique to win his other (there has been many) reality show, the Apprentice.  Did reality tv prepare us for what we are dealing with today?

 

Where is this all taking us?  I was a little kid when Nixon and his “silent majority” took sides against the hippies.  Reading the history of the turbulent 60’s, which was actually more the late 60’s and early 1970’s, I can see a similarity between then and now.  Yet, those “hippies” were fighting to keep their classmates and loved one’s from dying in Vietnam.  Today’s positive and negative are fighting with the same vigor as sides in the 60’s, but without the same dire consequences that resulted with sending kids off to war.  So, the fight we are watching in “real time” at the campus of Berkeley or the rally fueled streets of Every City, USA is manufactured outrage.

 

Who benefits from manufactured outrage?  Twitter, Facebook, radio, news sites, and YouTube increase their traffic when people from both our positive and negative sides go to bitch to each other.  Yes, mainly bitching to their own tribe about the other tribe.  Confirmation bias is another “tribal instinct” of human beings.  It leads to the building of communities in the virtual world, which is more than just a virtual world is our psyche.  So, it is our own doing, this undoing.

 

 

 

✈️

Recent terror warnings regarding “bomb laptops” has the industry thinking of banning laptops from the cabin of all flights including domestic.  Traveling across the country without my laptop would be horrible.  I usually load work and movies and keep myself busy with the in flight wifi.  The only problem is battery life.

Why wouldn’t our airlines be proactive and offer keyboard tablets preloaded with movies, MS Office and a web browser for email?  That way they can keep the units plugged in and offer the fliers business and entertainment solutions.  Government loves to ban things in the name of safety without offering a solution to the citizens who have had to just “take it.”  “Flying is a privilege, not a right!”

The tablet idea could be the proactive idea that not only slaps terrorists in the face for trying to alter our way of life, but helps travelers deal with uncomfortable conditions with an escape.  I would think Apple, Google, Amazon or Microsoft would bid low for the opportunity.  Thoughts?

 

What is the next new technology that will revolutionize the world?  The Internet has made an unprecedented historical significance in the last US Presidential election.  The historical  impact of the Internet as a form of communication and an extension of media is mind blowing.  Yet, without electricity there is no Internet!  What is the next “Electricity” to be discovered?