Skip to main content

Ads that I like #38


Now, I do appreciate the sentiment expressed in today's ad, and (as ever) context is vital. When you're in the middle of a war a certain liberty may be taken with expression, so the jarring notion of a blonde, curly-haired scamp - let's call him 'Chip' - talking about "Jap kids" (in a strange and foreign font, no less) can be overcome.

Yet what really concerns me about this ad is the odd lens through which the Sparton company have chosen (in 1943) to define what it means to be a "free American boy". Free speech and action, yep, no problemo. "Free American boys" should experience those delights.

"Warm comfortable homes". Well, homes are a good start, and I guess you wouldn't want it cold. Comfortable? That surely is in the eye of the beholder? But yeah, comfortable is good, I guess.

"Automobiles and radios by the million"? Yeah, you're starting to lose me here Sparton.

"Electrical machines to keep and cook our food; to wash and clean for us"? See, now pick the right voice to read this one out loud, add an evil laugh at the end, and I'm conjuring up images of a downtrodden race of slave robots forced to do the bidding of cruel and unforgiving masters.

Moreover, it appears that the Sparton company believes that World War II might be being fought not so much to rid the world of brutal and ruthless aggressors in Tokyo or Berlin, rather the bloodiest and costly war in human history is being fought to establish a world of "comfort", "convenience" and "enjoyment".

Hmmmmmm.

This world will be delivered through a "money-saving plan of distribution".

Hmmmmmm.

Through "exclusive Sparton dealer - only one in each community". It seems that "that is the Sparton way".

It sounds to me like the Sparton company might have been better off to pack up and move to Soviet Russia with that sort of attitude.

You'd almost rather be a JAP kid!
Labels:

Comments

Gerald (Ackworth born) said…
and alas such attitudes still prevail - we seem to have learnt little in the last 60 years.
16 April 2008 at 17:34
Kris McCracken said…
I think like most eras we tend to learn a lot, but forget the lessons a lot of the time!
16 April 2008 at 20:07
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...
5 comments
Read more

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...
38 comments
Read more

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.
36 comments
Read more