So there are two worlds. The fantasy world of luxury youth and eternal yachts, and the real world of middle age spread, wrinkles, plastic surgery and where someone else always has a bigger boat.
For obvious reasons, communications agencies tend to focus on the fantasy world, creating desire for goods and services through brands that provide a gateway in to the media Elysium.
But maybe it’s more like the Asylum. The more time we spend in brand land, the more difficult it is to get back. The harder we find it to deal with the real world, not because it’s so horrific or boring, but because we have more control over our dreams.
But things happen.
Cars prang, cards freeze, babies scream, trains cancel, people catch cold and spill coffee all down their shirt.
No worries, this is why we have a sense of humour – why we need one. It’s good to see the funny side, “I can laugh now, but oh at the time…” This is a genuine response to a real situation, it’s a way of coping.
But things happen that are too ghastly and terrible to find funny, well you’d think so until you hear a sick joke about them, but again this is about dealing with it.
It’s the real world not the fantasy one which provokes the strongest reactions. It’s the real one which causes us to make fun of something, bury our head in the sand, or lash out and use it as an excuse to do something terrible ourselves – like invade another country...(ahem).
The question is, are we getting any better at living in the real world? Why are we still not taking responsibility, why are we neglectful and apathetic and still refuse to take real world issues like climate change seriously? Is the media helping us to get better at living or better at escaping?
“Impending environmental disaster? No the Summers keep getting better!”
But if communications agencies can help us to escape surely they can help us to engage. So what about brands that are authentic, that are switched on, that are in the real world?
Typically this has been about guilt and shock. Images of tortured rabbits and emaciated children are used to jerk us into doing something - at arms length to drop the coin in the slot while we hold our nose. Or alternatively an overly sentimental view of nature and relationships - holding hands watching a ‘sunset reflected in a crystal’ type thing.
But the real world isn’t about horror and wishy-washy sentiment, it’s about passion and energy and personality. Engaging in the real world gives us a sense of purpose, clarity, belonging and confidence.
Authentic brands have more opportunity to touch audiences than ones that sell us a dream. Because after all, deep down we know what real life is like, we all feel passion and enjoy a sense of purpose and belonging.
Ethical Media is about making sense of the real world. Using communications to bring people closer to the things that really matter. We develop real world brands which leverage the positive rather than the negative, which make people feel comfortable about being engaged.