Four times a week I take the MRT to school. It’s a long commute, but it mostly requires me to stand around while I’m whizzed by a steel machine. On this hour long commute, I am entertained by flashy images that pepper EDSA. Most of the ads are for clothes and prosthetics – I mean body care, read: a lot of billboards with attractive, half-naked Filipinos models. I can picture a contemporary Mad Men episode where Don Draper is faced with ad A) model in a tight jump suit marketing not the clothing but the abs that are clearly visible on the guy’s abdomen, or ad B) woman adorned with recycled rags representing what it means to really be an environmentalist. Draper would look at ad A and then ad B then say something like, “This isn’t what people want. No, men and women both want to be free – free from the city’s steel bars, free from the norms of society. [Dramatic pause] Think Free.” He then pulls out his own poster with two models barely naked, nothing but a loin cloth hiding the model’s private parts. “Ladies, gentlemen, Bench’s new direction – ‘Uncut.’ I think that’s actually what happened. I saw three fifty feet tall underwear ads. Three!
I’m surprised that there hasn’t been a car crash apocalypse on EDSA yet. Hmm… This sounds like a wonderful new idea for the game Burnout. We can call it Burnout: Deadly Distractions. And what you do, instead of driving a car into oncoming traffic, is place an ad beside the street that would distract male drivers, causing them to crash their cars. Leading to a multi-million dollar car pile up.
I wonder if anyone is as embarrassed by Philippines’ un-conservative marketing as I am. And people ask my why I shifted away from my advertising major.
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