In three quarters of a century from the time I first watched some snowy, black and white images, television programming has evolved into the primary source of entertainment and information in the large majority of American households. Ours is no exception.
I admit that I originally considered television a static generator that thwarted my attempts to listen to baseball games on the radio. My dad, sympathetic to my plight, purchased me a desktop FM radio.
Then, Dragnet and The $64,000 Question appeared. I began to watch the The Red Skelton Show each week with my grandparents.
I think it was through watching television with my grandfather that my interest in television commercials evolved. He was always interested in what was being sold and how. He introduced me to the idea of “product placement.” It wasn’t an accident that the hero smoked Lucky Strikes or more exactly, that you knew the hero smoked Lucky Strikes.
Of course, we had a history. We had listened to the Gillette Friday Night Fights together for years. Boxing was a man’s thing and so were razors and shaving. He felt Gillette made good use of their sponsorship.
The definition of shaving in today’s television has expanded. After I’ve finished blushing, I ask Billie, “Did you see that commercial?” I wonder what my grandfather would have thought.
As with the oldest of sayings, I guess everything does change. Car commercials have changed. They are no longer focused on power and speed. I like the commercial in which the mother says she never really appreciated the auto until she saw her child and her husband walk away from an accident. I’m for safe cars.
However, as I drive around the Tulsa streets, I know somebody must still be selling speed and power. I also see vehicles that strike me as being designed for an African safari. Then, I remind myself that we have to be on guard for all the rhinos that inhibit Utica Square.
I remind myself that commercials are a small price to pay for sitting in my living room and watching the NCAA tournament basketball games. Can there be a better four days of sports than the wall-to-wall basketball that first weekend of games provides?
I enjoy the commercials that feature several former basketball players and others. If “the round mound of rebound” can’t make you smile – Well.
There is advertising that does concern me. Has some informational programing become advertising for political or social positions? A true news program tells me the news. I struggle with a program that wishes to interpret the news for me. I know how I feel about an accident, a weather event, a crime or a criminal.
The program has become an advertisement.
I hope everyone has some tidbit of entertainment that keeps them alert, interested and happy. Something that rescues us from otherwise boring circumstances. I think we are entitled to that much.
Advertising is the art of convincing people to spend money they don’t have for something they don’t need. – Will Rogers
