I was hoping to publish a post about some of the recent projects we’ve embarked on, but I decided to steer clear of that for the moment, because something more important has caught our attention. Yes, it is none other than spam; only not the spam in the can, but the appropriated name that refers to e-mail blasts that you receive from soliciting bots, companies, and other unlikely characters that fill up your inbox with junk messages about VIAGRA, PARIS HILTON, GAINING A FEW INCHES, LOSING A FEW POUNDS, and any other ridiculous message that has nothing to do with who you are as an individual.
Now, let’s take it a step further. Why is it that people who are bent on being unsociable are so quick, and inclined to join the ranks of the so called “socially elite” or in other words “social networking sites?”
Well, I’m sure there are by now hundreds of definitions, but ultimately it comes down to the social responsibility of the industry designer. In saying that, I suppose I have to shed light on what those responsibilities would be. Well, like I said, social responsibilities, in which designers do, in fact, have an impact on the economy, or developing countries, or the everyday product consumer, and can make social changes, such as; influencing tyrannical governments to give it’s people back their freedom, or shedding light on certain corporations who steer far from running socially responsible businesses (whose bulk success derives from the employment of children, or pays out their employees in ridiculously low wages, undermines fair trade agreements, or whose actions are detrimental to anyone and everyone who buys into their bullshit propaganda campaigns).
Let’s come up with an example, like… Unilever. Wait, what the hell is Unilever? Well, Unilever is Dove. Yes, Dove soap. Now here’s a company thats main campaign is about promoting natural beauty by exploiting semi overweight women who use dove, and by using dove, makes them comfortable in their lifestyle, and of course, gives their skin a beautiful sleek sheen that can only be achieved by exfoliating with Dove, (apparently).
Hmmm, so why is Dove / Unilever so bad? They’re seen as promoting natural beauty in its purist form, and they actually go so far as to peddle out a video called “Evolution“, depicting the industry process for transforming a girl off the street into a billboard model for some generic makeup ad campaign, resulting in a closing conclusion that the public’s sense of beauty is horribly distorted (which it is, in fact), all while (indirectly) excluding themselves from such accusations .
That’s great, right? Of course it is, but not if the whistle blower is just as corrupt as the instigator, like Unilever is. That’s right. Unilever / Dove is just as bad, if not, worse than what is depicted in the “Evolution” video. Why are they just as bad? Well, for example, Dove’s Parent company “Unilever” is responsible for all of Dove’s supposed “natural beauty” campaigns, that generally depict women overweight, or elderly women posing nude, to show that beauty is all in the eye of the beholder, and that everyone is beautiful, and (subliminally) anyone who cares about their self-esteem regarding beauty should use Dove soap, because Dove actually cares about YOU. I’m sorry, but hearing that come from Dove is absolute bologna, especially if Unilever, (reiterating that Unilever is Dove’s parent company, and is responsible for promoting this natural beautify campaign), is also Axe body spray’s parent company. You know, Axe body spray, the same body spray that usually produces videos depicting “young, and attractive” men and women in sexually explicit situations. That’s right, it’s the same damn company.
Hmmm, so what is their stance on natural beauty exactly, and how can they peddle a video like “Evolution”, and then turn around and create an Axe Body spray commercial? I’m sorry, but that is really confusing to me. These are the same people dishing this crap out, and not until recently are people actually beginning to catch on. Maybe you’ll get a better idea of just how phony this “Unilever / Dove / Axe Body spray” company is if you just watch their commercials back to back. How about it?
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Well, I don’t know about you, but I feel those are some pretty contradicting videos, especially with the fact that those messages are all coming from the same source, UNILEVER.
Now, how does that tie into Designism, (The Designer’s social responsibility)? Well, let’s use Ogilvy and Mather as an agency for example, although they have been commissioned by Unilever to produce these “natural beauty” campaigns for Dove. With a company like Ogilvy and Mather, you’d think that they would catch such obvious contradictions, but apparently they’re either too slow, or could really care less. Either way, they’re a perfect example of what NOT to do as far as designism is concerned, although they haven’t really practiced designism at all in any case.
Now, if this were a “perfect” world, (that being very subjective, so I’ll rephrase that), or “my” perfect world, I would have to politely decline Unilever’s offer to work on their Dove campaign, solely on the grounds that their campaign is a contradiction, and ultimately misleading, which in turn may potentially have detrimental effects on our own brand equity, as well as theirs. Obviously someone overlooked that minute detail. Well, it’s not minute anymore. The cat’s out of the bag, and people are slowly but surely catching on.
To break it down for you, just think in terms of “cause and effect.” The world is obviously a pretty messed up place, and no matter where you live, there’s always some GIANT taking advantage of the everyday, rat racing, don’t have time to look at the label while shopping, consumer, hoping they’ll “OBEY.”
Well, to your own demise, because YOU as a consumer, and YOU as a designer are solely responsible for companies such as Unilever getting away with such contradictory campaigns. If you don’t care, well okay, keep telling yourself that when your son or daughter wind up bulimic, anorexic, or utterly lost and confused when they’re trying to fit into some social group / gathering, and they’re being denied left and right because they’re not “blond” enough, or “pretty” enough, or “tall” enough, or “skinny” enough, or they don’t come from the right background, or they don’t have a Louis Vuitton, Chanel, or Prada bag, sunglasses, purse, etc… Oh, but don’t worry, because we’ve got Dove to combat such distorted campaigns by companies like Axe Body spray. Dove will boost your self-esteem, all while revitalizing that natural inner beauty.
Ha! I don’t know about you, but this Unilever / Dove / Axe Body spray situation reminds me of Fight Club (in more ways than one), and the schizophrenic battle between Tyler Derdan (Brad Pitt), and the Narrator (Edward Norton).
Anyway, I’m sorry for all of you who believe that situations like these are blown out of proportion by people like me, and that they’re not as serious as people (like myself) would have you believe. On the contrary I’m afraid. The fact is that these are serious problems that affect the youth of the world everyday, and people in general I might add. I’m sorry, but there’s no divine intervention that is going to occur that’s going to fix all of humanities problems. Even if there were, it shouldn’t happen, because whether we like it or not, we’re responsible for how bad things have become. They’re so bad that people still believe there’s nothing wrong at all. If situations like this are going to stop from happening, we have to take a stance and say, “NO, I’m not going to support you, and ethics and morals don’t carry a price tag, PERIOD.”
Okay, well I think I’ve ranted enough. In closing I suppose this hints at Colorcubic’s manifesto, which is that our Moral, Ethical, and Social stance will not be bought. We don’t design to make a quick buck. We design because we care about the work we produce, and how that has an effect on the people who view it, use it, and ultimately live by it.
Oh, and to the cat on QBN who believes social changes come from signing up with some political party, and joining congress, and not by attacking the problem at the core (you know who you are). You’re living in a very naïve bubble. It’s the media that controls governments and it’s people (unfortunately), and not the other way around.
Last year, I became fascinated with the Grameen Bank, an organization founded by Muhammad Yunus that provides microcredit to the poor to fund small businesses to pull their families out of poverty. Since Grameen’s inception, microloans have been provided to more than 7 million borrowers all over the world (97 percent of whom are women), all without collateral, based purely on mutual trust.
I was having a conversation about microcredit with an accountant friend a couple weeks ago and she said something about how they must have a low rate of repayment since they are giving out loans to the poor. Amazingly enough, they have a loan-repayment rate of over 95 percent (according to the Grameen web site)! The poor have a better track record of repayment than the wealthy because they have so much more to lose if they don’t repay. Of course, nothing is ever perfect, and Grameen occasionally encounters periods of repayment difficulties but continually proves to rebound from such delinquencies.
RESOURCES
Yunus’ 1997 autobiography Banker to the Poor is a great resource if you’d like to learn more about Muhammad Yunus, the Grameen Bank and microcredit. Yunus also recently wrote a new book called “Creating a World Without Poverty” which I’m looking forward to reading.
Another amazing microcredit organization is called Kiva. Kiva allows you to lend to entrepreneuers featured on the Kiva site, as little as $25 at a time. Once your Kiva loan is repaid, you can choose to withdraw your funds, or give it to a new entrepreneur.
United Colors of Benetton just launched their own microcredit organization called Africa Works. You can find a special collection of Africa Works t-shirts designed for the campaign in select Benetton stores.
sorry it’s been a while since we’ve updated our site with posts.
We’ve been so slammed with projects, it’s hard to find time to update this on a regular basis. We’ve also moved offices, (which was very time consuming, but definitely worth it).
We’re catching up with a lot of topics that we feel are relevant not only to the design / development community, but also to people that are concerned with sustainability, and social entrepreneurship.
Anyway, we hope that you find the coming topics useful for your own personal, and professional growth.
Feel free to contact us with any questions that you may have regarding the content of our posts.
The original article is from June’s issue of Vanity Fair, which is titled, “The Africa Issue.” You may read the original article on Vanity Fair online.
Letter from Uganda
Sachs speaking at a school in the village of Ruhiira, Uganda, January 2007. Ruhiira is participating in Sachs’s Millennium Villages Project. Photograph by Guillaume Bonn.
Jeffrey Sachs’s $200 Billion Dream
Jeffrey Sachs—visionary economist, savior of Bolivia, Poland, and other struggling nations, adviser to the U.N. and movie stars—won’t settle for less than the global eradication of extreme poverty. And he hasn’t got a second to waste.
by Nina Munk July 2007
In the respected opinion of Jeffrey David Sachs—distinguished Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development at Columbia University, director of the Earth Institute, and special adviser to the secretary-general of the United Nations—the problem of extreme poverty can be solved. In fact, the problem can be solved “easily.” “We have enough on the planet to make sure, easily, that people aren’t dying of their poverty. That’s the basic truth,” he tells me firmly, without a doubt.
It’s November 2006, and Sachs has just addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations. His message is straightforward: “Millions of people die every year for the stupid reason they are too poor to stay alive.… That is a plight we can end.” Afterward, as the two of us have lunch in the crowded U.N. cafeteria, overlooking New York’s East River, he continues: “The basic truth is that for less than a percent of the income of the rich world nobody has to die of poverty on the planet. That’s really a powerful truth.”
Sachs speaking at a school in the village of Ruhiira, Uganda, January 2007. Ruhiira is participating in Sachs’s Millennium Villages Project. Photograph by Guillaume Bonn.