Stompy

I read through the first few pages of this thread and, don't take this the wrong way, I have to say that there's a lot of "tinfoil hat" wearing going on here.

I don't really ever listen to the radio. TV... I watch occasionally. One or two sitcoms, some Adult Swim, that's about it. Probably no more than an hour or two a week. I watch a lot of movies.

News... I don't pay attention to local news. I'll glance at CNN occasionally to see what's going on in the world.

I consider myself so far detached from effects of "media" and advertising that I had a very hard time relating to much of what was posted in this thread. I did, however, understand the points that were made on how one could probably misinterpret one thing as something else.

First off, I want to make a comment on the pictures shown - when I looked at the picture of the flowers, I saw flowers. When I looked at the Gin, I saw Gin. Later, when someone said, "Sex" is hidden in the pictures, I went back and saw it. Ok, nice optical illusion. What exactly does this prove aside from the fact that the eye tends to immediately focus on a more dominant color?

Same with the dolphin/sexual picture. All that proves is that it's a clever optical illusion - there isn't anything "hidden" going on aside from that. Your eyes see the picture and they naturally pick up the image of the two people. It'd be the same if the image was a plane, car, apple, whatever made up of small starfish or waffles.

Second, referring to the Palmolive pictures - what point are you trying to make? The arm belongs to another person with the words "Who can resist the gentle touch". As if hordes of people rush out to suddenly buy up the world's stock in palmolive or something. When I buy soap, I think, "I need some dish soap because I have dishes to wash. I don't give a damn what kind it is, it just better work good." Likewise if I buy bars of soap/shower gel. I buy what smells good and doesn't make my skin feel like crap.

Same with the Gin. Yeah, I could see how it somewhat resembles the word "sex" in the ice cubes, but there's no proof presented with that picture to show that the brain picks out that insanely hidden item to associate Gin with "sex". Did people get this sudden urge and say, "You know, Gin sounds pretty good right about now"? You have to look pretty hard to see it. When I buy alcohol, I buy whatever tastes good for the simple fact that I want to enjoy a nice buzz. I could care less if there's a bottle of absolut shoved up some girl's crotch or a bottle of budweiser being deep throated by a cheerleader. The last alcohol I purchased was a bottle of Barenjager. Honestly, I've never seen an ad for it in my life. I normally buy Corona - those commercials have people lounging on a beach enjoying a nice vacation. I could care less. It could show the bottles submerged in a vat of maggots. That particular beer tastes good to me, so it's what I buy. I'm assuming most people are the same way.

What's up with the picture of the water being sprayed everywhere? What, the water bottle represents a phallic object and the water spraying all over is supposed to be semen? It's bottled water. I think it's stupid to buy bottled water as it is, but that's another story.

I have an example: Axe body spray. Those commercials are so blatantly full of sex, it's not even funny. I can see how people would go out and buy that, because it smells good. Are people seduced by the sex? Probably, but it's an ad. The ad is saying, "Hey, if you want to smell good, come check this product out." No one wants to smell like ASS, right?

I believe that if you pay attention to one thing long enough, you'll see it all over. The same applies to certain mathematics and how people are amazed at how certain numbers are abundant in nature, etc. In this case, the obsessed topic happens to be sex. I'm not denying that the media puts images of sexy women to sell beers or whatever, but it's not like it's this grand conspiracy in an attempt to control your life make you buy strange amounts of palmolive, gin, or Dasani.

The kid looking anxious into the book while the woman in the background has her hand by her crotch... yeah, if you stare at it (like any other picture), I'm sure you can get a huge novel out of it: "Hey, hurry up and straighten your life out so we can go have sex. Then I can buy you a pizza and we can build some stuff out of legos!" I just have a hard time believing that people see something like that and suddenly get this urge to go take out a loan or think "shit, my life is in ruins."

The Phillip Morris picture w/ the kid on the snowboard... it looks like a match. Wouldn't it be more beneficial to have them embed a hidden cigarette in the outline of the skiier's jacket? Why a match? The subliminal mind picks it up, "Hey, let's go light a match. Yay."

Speaking of subliminal minds, last I heard, many studies have shown that there's no evidence of subliminal marketing on people. Or is that what "they" want me to think? The guy who put images of popcorn and coke in between clips in his movie theater.. didn't he later admit to lying about the fact that it drove up his sales?

Just because there's an ad for it on the TV doesn't make someone "consumer sheep" if they go out and buy something, either. No one is holding a gun to your head and forcing you to buy these things.

For example, I need a new vacuum. I happened upon a commercial for a Dyson vacuum that claims it works great and sucks up all kinds of junk out of your carpet. I went online, read reviews, and found that almost all who use it say it's damn great! So if I buy this, what exactly am I falling prey to? I DO need a new vacuum considering my old one is a POS.. and I DO want my house to remain clean!

What about commercials for places that have sales on clothes, or Best Buy ads that say, "DVDs are 10% off this week!" No one's forcing you to buy DVDs. It's saying, "Hey, if there's a DVD you want, come by our place because we're having this crazy thing called a sale."

Personally, I don't pay attention to most ads, and maybe that's the reason I'm skeptical about a lot of what's in this thread (or, at least, the first half). In the rare occasion that I do watch TV, I flip the channel whenever a commercial comes on. Commercials are a nuisance to me I guess I was lucky enough to associate "commercial" with "boring, change it now" as a child.

Like I said, if you pay attention and focus on one thing, you'll find it anywhere and everywhere you look.

...and They Live is a kick ass movie. You also need a video playback device and a television to watch it (they got you by the balls w/ that one!), unless you pick up the horrible censored version on USA or something.

I'll read the rest of the thread later, but so far it's interesting if you ever wanna stike up a chat with someone about off the wall conspiracy theories.

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