A response to George Monbiot's balls

The writer used his Guardian column yesterday evening to pen an attack on the advertising industry as "a poison that demeans even love".

There's so much wrong with this is article it's difficult to know where to begin. It's certainly true that advertisers must face up to ethical responsibilities around targeting children and invading privacy. But at every stage, he takes the argument a step too far.

"Some adverts appear to promote intrinsic values, associating their products with family life and strong communities. But they also create the impression that these values can be purchased, which demeans and undermines them."

Do they? When was the last time anyone watched a family bouncing around happily on a DFS sofa and think "oh hey, if I buy DFS, maybe my family will be happy like theirs"?

The truth, of course, is far less sinister. DFS know that families are a major demographic target for their goods, so they put a family in the advert to indicate this. Just like left-wing parents take their kids on marches, even when they're too young understand the banners they're holding, in the full knowledge that they'll make an effective photo opportunity.

"As a report by the progressive thinktank Compass explains, the messages used by advertisers are designed to trigger emotional rather than rational responses"


Yes, and George Monbiot and other left-wing columnists never use emotive language to encourage us to see their side of the argument.


"Advertising claims to enhance our choice, but it offers us little choice about whether we see and hear it, and ever less choice about whether we respond to it."


Oh, balls. If this was true, we'd never stop spending money. I don't see an advert for EasyJet and leap for the laptop to make a booking. But if, for example, I fancied a holiday in Europe, then maybe I'd start thinking about where I could find hotels and flights and ideas for places to go, and remember the EasyJet ad.

I could equally well, of course, go to a flight comparison site, like thousands do every day, and decide for myself who I want to go with.

Which brings me to a wider point - that every advance in the sophistication of advertising is matched by the sophistication of consumers. The industry is getting cleverer because it has to. People are more aware of advertising and how it works than ever before. Consumer advice programmes, news, blogs, and social media make us more aware of product faults and unethical practices than ever before.

And finally, there's a massive sense of entitlement about all this. It's like those libertarians on the right who complain about taxes being too high then complain that the council services are poor and the NHS didn't treat them fast enough. Just how many websites do we use every day, of our own free choice, that charge us absolutely nothing to use their services? How many hours of TV (outside of the BBC) do we watch?

Then ask how many people do these websites and TV channels employ? How much equipment do they need to purchase and maintain in order for you to enjoy and use their product? And you think that this should all come for free?

Advertising, just like free-market capitalism, needs to come with ethics and it needs a safety net. But it is the sister of democracy, and unless you ditch that, you can't ditch advertising either.

I know which combination I'd choose.