Sky King, Dryer Balls, and the Perils of Being Misled
A television network wants to know which of their formulaic pap is my “favorite television show”. I would laugh, but I think they are serious. I am somehow supposed to choose a show that is really a commercial for granite and quartz countertops, shiplap, and various floorings and make it important enough to be a favorite offering?
W A Y back in the dark ages of television, a tobacco company put out a nighttime cowboy show. After a while, they questioned a select number of viewers and found that their show was mostly watched by children. Children were not buying their product, but the show was popular, so they gave it to another company with product offerings for younger set.
Quality has never been big in the advertisement game. If you don’t believe that, watch a show that you watched and loved as a child. I loved “Sky King” when I was small. The King flew all over saving people and Penny, his niece, was a fantastic young girl who helped. Then, I saw the show through adult eyes. Most of it was stock footage of the plane and Penny looked to be in her thirties, not some youngster role model. It was a disappointment. However, it was a disappointment that taught me something, so I’ll take it on the chin.
The lesson here is to step back and put these things in proper perspective. “Sky King” was a great babysitter. My mother knew that she would have half an hour of peace—something parents crave so the work of keeping children gets done. In return, we were propagandized into thinking that chocolate milk or some cereal was the ultimate treat. She happily supplied us with a chocolate product for our daily glass of milk we would have had anyway, and bought the cereal we would have eaten, anyway. It was pretty much a win for her.
Along about the time I had children of my own, television became something parents had to carefully monitor. Marshall McLuhan obliquely declared “the medium is the message,” and Norman Lear decided the message could be much better propaganda than to sell choice products. Where we had Channel Eleven and Channel Three, stations proliferated until, nowadays, we are buried in them.
It can be hard to separate propaganda from entertainment, but I think we must try. If not, we are jumping on a bandwagon that takes us where we do not want to go. There is no virtue in granite countertops and if you are paying for something you cannot afford, it becomes a negative.
It’s a faulty way to make one’s decisions. It’s no longer Ovaltine and Rice Krispies. This is our life choices and we need a more discerning eye. Hurting people who are not on our side is not enough—when we should not be hurting anyone. Buying expensive things and thinking it passes as virtue is stupid. Getting our point of view from a television show is like thinking Penny was a winner. She was an actress who was a little too old for the part she was playing and I feel silly that I didn’t see that even as a child.
My father was a soldier in World War II and they were taught how to know when they were being led or misled. He made us read the various forms of propaganda and brought us up with a maxim that was silly, but teachable. The only place for propaganda, he said, was with the proper goose. I bought my own “goose” recently when I was in a big box store and saw dryer balls. They were cheap, they were cute with little owl faces and I was in a hurry. How many strange decisions are made in a hurry? I brought them home, named them Wilson and Wally and tried them in a load of laundry. I honestly can’t say if they help. The propaganda says they help; the real result is mixed. They may dry some things faster by beating the folds out. And they remind you the dryer is running with their thump, thump, thump as they go ‘round.
Think of how we are influenced by these common propaganda strategies: the bandwagon effect, emotional word use, testimonials, name calling, plain talk, glittering generalities, transfer, repetition, faulty cause and effect, and more. Our favorite television character is crass and crude and it suddenly looks good. Joe Namath plaintively cries, “You have time to make a phone call!” and we are supposed to forget that maybe we do not want what he’s selling. Careful use of propaganda on television has made us into a nation of foul talking, insulting, and hurtful ninnies who are easily sold anything that glitters. From commercials to programs to what passes as news, we are lied to and misled. And instead of saying no to all of it, we think the best way to handle it is to choose the liars and pushers that we most agree with and the programs with ones we think are the hottest hotties.
It was all fine until Wilson went missing. We have gone through the linen, the dress shirts, sweaters–anything with a sleeve. We have not found Wilson. Watching two adults squeeze the clothing in their closets and dig through an overstuffed linen closet is ridiculous. We have become way too interested in the fate of Wilson.
All I can say is: let this be your lesson.
And, yes, I searched the bottom of my closet.