People say a lot of things…
The popular belief is that exercise burns fat, and we even verbalize this belief. But science, or more specifically biology says otherwise.
The methods by which we dispose of fat deposits are through different ways and I am sure being active can only help, and I am also sure how our individual bodies work, such as level of health and age may determine the speed at which we lose fat.
We do not burn fat, your body must dispose of fat deposits through a series of complicated, or perhaps, complex metabolic pathways. Byproducts of fat metabolism leave your body in the form of water, through your skin (when you sweat) and your kidneys (when you urinate). Fat may also leave the body as carbon dioxide, through your lungs (when you breathe out) and I suppose in other less pleasant ways…
People say a lot of things…
We make proclamations about motivation and beliefs but we never define what those parameters are because believe it or not, there are parameters.
We say stand up for your beliefs or throw them all away and live on your knees under someone else’s belief. Is a leader who declares war not standing up for their beliefs? Or should they give up those beliefs and live under someone else’s rule?
Freedom and liberty are gallant fights that also require parameters…Most people have a childlike perception of freedom. But this is not the way of the world, society, or humans, we need rules and guidelines. We must understand that we are free to speak but only within these parameters for the betterment of society, and civility. We are not allowed to run about and just say and do what we like.
We are not born callous as a species, we have a default response to the tragedy, and this often overshadows objectivity. There is no human justification for war in regards to suffering. However, is Putin not standing up for his beliefs and Ukraine is standing up for their beliefs? Putin’s actions are extreme and this removes the concern regarding reasons leading up to the present conflict.
I simply believe that without objectivity, there can be no proper conversation and objectivity is void of who is innocent and who is guilty. Tragedy is an entirely different conversation and yes, save lives in any way possible.
However, this article is not about Ukraine and Russia, their conflict is an extreme example of my larger point.
People say a lot of things…
In the British science fiction anthology series Black Mirror, the second episode of Season 1 — Fifteen Million Merits — “In a world where people’s lives consist of riding exercise bikes to gain credits, Bing tries to help a woman get on to a singing competition show.” Daniel Kaluuya’s character ‘Bing’ loses his “nuts” and holds a broken glass to his neck and gives a heart-wrenching speech:
“I haven’t got a speech, I didn’t plan words, I didn’t even try to. I just knew that I had to get here, to stand here and I knew I wanted you to listen; to really listen, not just pull a face like you’re listening, like you do the rest of the time. A face like you’re feeling instead of processing. You pull a face and poke it towards the stage and la-di-da we sing and dance and tumble around and all you see up here, it’s not people, you don’t see people up here, it’s all fodder. And the faker the fodder is the more you love it because fake fodder’s the only thing that works anymore, fake fodder is all that we can stomach…” — actually not quite all. Real pain, real viciousness, that we can take. Yeah, stick a fat man up a pole and we’ll laugh ourselves feral cause we’ve earned the right, we’ve done cell time and he’s slacking the scum so ha ha ha at him. Cause we’re so out of our minds with desperation we don’t know any better. All we know is fake fodder and buying shit. That’s how we speak to each other, how we express ourselves is buying shit. I have a dream? The peak of our dreams is a new hat for our doppel, a hat that doesn’t exist. It’s not even there, we buy shit that’s not even there. Show us something real and free and beautiful, you couldn’t. It’d break us, we’re too numb for it, our minds would choke. There’s only so much wonder we can bear, that’s why when you find any wonder whatsoever you dole it out in meager portions, and only then til it’s augmented and packaged and pumped through ten thousand pre-assigned filters, til it’s nothing more than a meaningless series of lights, while we ride day-in, day-out — going where? Powering what? All tiny cells in tiny screens and bigger cells in bigger screens and fuck you. Fuck you, that’s what it boils down to is fuck you. Fuck you for sitting there and slowly knitting things worse. Fuck you and your spotlight and your sanctimonious faces and fuck you all, for taking the one thing I ever came close to anything real about anything. For oozing around it and crushing it into a bone, into a joke, one more ugly joke in a kingdom of millions and then fuck you. Fuck you for happening. Fuck you for me, for us, for everyone, fuck you”
In the end, Bing was made an offer like everyone else who performed on stage and he accepted that offer to stop riding the bike for credits.
It is no different in the world of brand, Marketing, and Advertising, people say a lot about what advertising is, what marketing is, and what brand is, but very few understand either of them whether by purpose or obscene desires.
What are the parameters?
When it comes to being authentic, perhaps honest, most people are not ok with that, we are holistically comfortable between what is abstract and what is real, otherwise it’s too vivid, visceral, or offensive. Marketing is not Advertising and brand needs both, but strategy can’t be simply limited to awareness, eyeballs. The objective can’t merely be “reach”.
Advertising is disruptive, and it is intrusive, but people don’t necessarily hate ads they despise bad ads, but how can the public be the judge of a bad or good ad? The truth is, they can, and in many other ways they can’t… a good ad works and a bad ad does not, but I don’t think that’s an issue for the public. They simply do not like their lives or content interrupted by something they have no interest in.
If the aim is simply awareness and the targeted audience is simply based on age, location, and demographic then someone is going to end up with an ad they don’t like, and they may be part of the smaller percentage of people targeted, so who cares, right? Concerns such as these gave birth to personalization and algorithms, advertising can now be more targeted, usually based on what you interact with within both the physical and digital space.
It did not necessarily make the ads any more good or bad than they already were. It is not unusual for me to hear or be in conversations where marketing, branding, and advertising are loosely thrown around ubiquitously to mean the same thing. Sometimes people develop strategies for marketing but it’s really for branding and vice versa.
People say a lot of things…
Brand loyalty is often debated, usually, there is someone arguing that brand loyalty does not exist because people don’t always buy the products offered by brands they claim to like. It becomes severely nonsensical the deeper the conversation goes.
The argument is based on a simple notion, if I claim Pepsi is my preferred brand, and I buy Coca-Cola even once, then it means I have no brand loyalty to Pepsi. Of course, that is absolute garbage.
Brand loyalty is a lot more than simply buying products. If I prefer Pepsi but as a product category, I essentially like cola as a beverage, and for many reasons, Pepsi may not be available at a particular location, on a particular day, or a particular time that I happen to be there…and I saw Coca Cola or Dr.Pepper, and I purchased what was there, it does not mean my loyalty to Pepsi has died.
If I am somewhere else and I see Pepsi, then I am naturally going to select Pepsi over any other cola being offered. Loyalty only dies if a conscious choice is made to choose another brand besides Pepsi for whatever the reasons may be.
Business management is responsible for sales, distribution, and perhaps procurement issues that could lead to a product not being available in all locations, or a location that is not a favorable market. That’s all business management, not the brand.
People say a lot of things…
Very few are actually bold enough to challenge expectations. Sometimes people need a jump start from disruption. When we speak about brand, marketing, and advertising, we gallantly tout about being authentic and people-centric, we are being bold and different. But no one is really being bold, we only speak up when the majority is offended but we are silent when the boat is not rocking.
As shown in this spot by Pilion Trust.
Or perhaps, this ad fake Austin Martin ad, the copy actually says “Pre-owed”, but it’s clever. This ad would never be ok in the public, it’s a good place or any brand to stand on.
People were offended by both ads for very different reasons but the point is, the ads worked, they are clever but provocative in their own way. The creative was executed around clear selling points, most likely from great copywriting. People will be offended but they will get over it…as long as when they spend their money they are not supporting a sweatshop with underpaid employees…but that’s a different topic for another time.
“He who dares not offend cannot be honest.” — Thomas Paine
A conversation usually has four components, facts, opinions, restrictive domain errors, and narrative errors.
We all have our biases, no one is truly objective, open, or liberal. We often use examples to prove our points are true, but more than I would like to admit it, we are usually governed by domains we built our beliefs on, which evidently restricts us from being objective. We create narratives to ensure that those beliefs are maintained and we defend them. So much so that even facts are debated which in itself is a downward spiral of irony.
Our cognitive processing creates a default disposition, we are walking contradictions. Selectively so.
