Advertising as Porn (Journal #1)

I think at times in my life advertising has been like porn for me. Like porn, advertising feeds on our need for love and acceptance. It tells us what is needed to make us loveable in the eyes of the world…what gadget, what trends, what will help us to be welcomed into the world. It tells us shortcomings and what is needed to fix them.

I fear that maybe I may have become a rat in the advertising world’s trap. It’s everywhere. As a self-professed magazine junkie, I cannot open a magazine without flipping through eight or more pages of ads before ever reaching the table of contents, if I ever at all. Advertising has become strange sort of lifestyle adviser for me. I typically know about that latest and greatest new gadget or the latest trends, this may be a result of actual advertising, but more so the result of magazines that have become hundred plus page advertisements that tell us what we need in amongst the actual ads.

Like others, I don’t think God has ever spoken to me through advertising. I think in reading the book and my own reflection I am beginning to realize how sad the world we live in is. For me, advertising seems to be showing me a world longing to be loved, no purchase necessary.