The Merchants of Cool

Today in Sociology, we watched a film by PBS about marketing to teens. It was called "The Merchants of Cool." Man alive, I am so much more cynical now... I'm scarred for life. One of the sections talked about 7th heaven, the WB show that was marketed as "family-friendly." The executives of WB wwere sitting there, and they said something to the effect of "For about a year there, we were 'family friendly.' What was our ad campaign?" "'We're the station that families can watch together.'" (laughter). They LAUGHED about how they were family friendly. My delusion that they actually cared was SHATTERED. These guys are straight up evil. They'll do anything for money. ANYTHING.

Also, we moved in our lecture from talking about "solid modernity" which is like a 1984 style society... CREEPY, to talking about a more BNW style society, called "liquid modernity." I'm excessively freaked out now. In the 1984 discussion, this concept of a jail called a Panopticon was discussed. The idea is that if prisoners THINK they're being watched, they won't even try to escape. We then discussed the fact that many of the camera bubbles you see are actually just that... BUBBLES. There's no camera inside. The important thing isn't watching you, it's making you think that you're being watched.

In our discussion of liquid modernity, the teacher showed the video mentioned above, The Mercahnts of Cool. In the video, the reporter asks whether our culture of getting what we "want" from corporations is really a good thing. He defines two groups invented by the media, a male that has never grown up, and is forever 13, and a female "midriff," a girl who flaunts her sexuality because it's "cool." These two figures are always on MTV, according to the correspondent.

I then went to lunch in the Cougareat, and... I was terribly frightened, because I noticed that that food court IS an advertisement. I could sit down and see over 30 distinct brand symbols without turning my head. THEN, I looked at myself. I'm wearing my East swimming sweater, which makes me a walking advertisement for Disney. AHHH!!! They're everywhere!!!!! NO!!!

Anywho, that's my sociology-induced freakout for today. In other news, I'm not going to get an A in my calc class. That so yearned-for 4.0? DOWN THE TUBES. I'm going to go burn some advertisements now. It won't change anything about our society... but it may make me feel better.