Somewhere in the neighborhood of last week, the negative political advertising began out our way.
That's kind of what I used to do when I was a political cartoonist. Always tearing down, rarely building up.
And people will talk about how awful negative campaign advertising is, and how it's so degrading, and how they wish all that mudslinging would just stop, but it doesn't, and it won't likely do so any time soon.
Why? Two words:
It works.
At least in the short run. And politics seems to be pretty much about the short run. So if nobody can stand the darn stuff, why does it work?
Religious organizations figured that one out a long time ago: fear. Fear works really well in the short run. And if you can keep people fearful, it works pretty well in the long run, too. To a point.
You see, it taps into one of our primal instincts: survival. After all, we need to know if there's a hungry beast prowling the nearby woods for our family, or if the tyrant over the next hill is going to attack. So fear serves a necessary purpose. Plus, all that adrenaline pumping through our system can be addictive, so we're always looking for the next thing to fear. It's a powerful, cheap drug.
Don't believe me? Ask a news editor. Bad news equals fear, equals ratings, equals sales. Equals cash. News editors know how to drive their market, just like any pusher.
I said it works to a point. The news media have it easiest. They have a constantly changing array of targets, so they don't usually come off as the bad guys, unless they stay on someone after the public's blood frenzy has passed. So they can be the good guys, the guards on the tower, the equal opportunity Paul Reveres.
But the politicians and the religious bunch don't have it so easy. There's always just their side, then there's the other guys. So attacks might be viewed as self-serving. And mean. And everybody knows, mean people suck.
The bottom line is a wonderfully objective measure of truth. The reason you don't see very many attack ads for products, is that it's no way to win brand loyalty. It might get you somewhere in the short run, but you pay a price and you'd better get off it fast. Almost all advertising is spent on telling you how good a company's product is, not how horrible the other guy's product is.
Of course, it's easy to tear down. It's much harder to offer a more excellent choice. If you demonize the other folks, you just have to be a little less of a devil to be the best choice available.
But you pay in brand loyalty, remember? And in politics that means number of eligible voters who actually went to the polls. Which these days, is not many. Not a big surprise, is it?
Not only is it easy to tear down, we've been taught that God apparently favors this tactic as well.
Sure He does.
Well, why else would the other religion be always portrayed as of the devil? Why does anything different than our own form of worship, belief, or ethics get preached, taught, and warned against?
Fear works pretty well for a while, but eventually, the voters stay away from the polls, and the faithful fall away. Because they're not really flocking to, they're running away. And when there's nothing left to run away from, or they realize they've been running from a lie, a made-up threat, your customer loyalty takes a big hit.
Look at the empty polling places.
The deserted churches and empty pews.
Think there might be a better way? Think the corporations might have got at least one thing right?
Now there's a scary thought.
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