You Did Not Just Go There!

It is reasonable to assume that I am not part of the demographic the F150 commercials are trying to attract. I have on occasion referred to the purveyors of those poorly built (Jeremy Clarkson's opinion, not mine!) gas-guzzlers as bottom-feeding scum that lay waste to the future of our planet out of nothing but pure greed. I have not had much better to say about their loyal customers, and worse still for any lobbyist who thwarts those who try to shield mother nature from their environmental matricide.

However, full strength vitriol is energy consuming and I am not, by nature, an activist. Over time, I have scaled back my ire for these environmental hazards to feelings of smug superiority any time I see one on the road. I even felt a slight sense of karma when I saw one spin out on an icy day, and then felt guilty for the rest of the day.

Until I saw the new F150 commercial, that is. Wrath back! Bigger and angrier than ever before. See if you can guess what crossed the line for me!

Ad Nauseum

I normally restrict this blog (still hate that word) to my knitting projects or the really mundane things that constitute my existence. Like, how big a pile of snow got or pictures of my new coffee mug. But it's good to branch out every so often, and so I thought I'd expand upon a pet peeve of mine. Televised commercials. Yes, I know, I am really departing from convention on that one. Who doesn't hate that the ad-makers sacrifice your living-room ambiance in favour of blaring volumes in order to compete for your attention, and ultimately your hard-earned cash? Worse still is the shear inanity of most commercials. Long gone are the halcyon days of the Hamlet commercials or drawn out teaser campaigns. No, bright and loud are what cut it now.
However, those are trite observations at this point. The more recent trend is to be completely inappropriate. Congratulations to both Verizon and Hardee's for their renewal of every negative stereotype of the Italian-American community. You know? The ones who have huge families, constant debt and Mafia ties (I learned everything I know about them from TV). Yet, that's a relative "after picture" of sensitivity training compared to Burger King's Whopper Virgin campaign. "They didn't even quite know how to pick it up." Wow. Way to make your taste test (versus McDonalds) as absolutely, and needlessly, tasteless as possible!
And if you're done figuratively vomiting in your mouth, why not do so literally? Seriously, why on earth did Mountain Dew think for a second that exploding giant bugs would entice us to ingest anything, never mind a product of that colour??
I wish they would pull all these recent offensive ads, and in their place, air footage of the advertising agency pitch meeting where someone suggests these campaigns, and no one in the room points out how atrocious they are. At least, I haven't seen that wretched Vehix woman in a while.

Day 15: Sure, I'll get right on that!

I was watching Arrested Development on Veoh today while reading some papers. As it is a legal site, commercials play every so often, and invariably, the sudden increase in volume makes me jump out of my seat and drop all my notes. However, Firefox has this wonderful plug-in that somehow manages to block commercials, so instead of some obnoxiously poly-decibel jingle, there is about 30 seconds of silence. Veoh/Hulu is so concerned that I'll miss hearing about what's new in SUV's/Dog food/Investment Banking, that it has taken to suggesting that I shut off this filter, and resume my tinnitus-building commerce... There are so many sardonic responses that I could make here, I can't pick just one! Maybe if they let me make 2 for the price of 1?

Day 10: I'm "literally" going to kill someone if I see this commercial again!

Most people have heard my rant about the Vehix commercial, but as I have seen it ad nauseam (lol) today, I decided to add it to my month in photos exercise.
The video opens with this woman in a ridiculous hat, sitting in the trunk of her car for some unknown reason. She kicks off the commercial with "So, I go on vehix.com and you can literally take a test drive". Those of us who are fleetingly familiar with the English language know that you can't literally test drive cars on a website. Indeed, our trendy hat-toter knows this too, as she, later in the commercial, says "You're practically driving the car." Well, which is it? You can't literally and practically do something; they mean opposite things. And take that stupid hat off! It's bad enough that you sound like an idiot. There's no need look like one too.

Juliet: Detective Lassiter is literally on fire.
Shawn: What kind of fire are we talking about? Michael Jackson in the Pepsi commercial fire or misusing the word "literally" fire?