See [www.culteducation.com]

I totally agree that this statement from Douglas Atkins is completely absurd.
Now where he got those ideas, i do not know. Maybe from some zany college prof, or maybe from Werner Erhard. I am sure Atkins would LOVE Landmark. He would think its a terrific business model.

What he is lying about, of course, is the fact that people are DUPED and TRICKED when they join a cult, using covert techniques of Influence.
But guys like Atkins think this is GREAT!
After all, that's how he can make so much money.

Also, these Advertising Guru guys all need some kind of bogus pseduo-intellectual schtick, to bamboozle the suits who sign their cheques. Baffle them with bullshit.
Seriously, i have seen how the Ad Game works, and really its a big con-game. The Suits don't know anything, except they provide the money.

Who knows what that guy really thinks.
He strikes me as a typical fast-talking Ad-Man. Those guys can charge a lot of money for their "services".

Coz

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glam

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But I unreservedly say that cults are a good thing; that the people who join them are normal, and they do so for very good reasons. Healthy societies need cults. Cults are, if you like, the spores of change in a society. Every major religion in the world was a cult at one time. Christianity was simply one of many mystery cults in [the] eastern Mediterranean 2,000 years ago. [The early Christians], like the Mormons and like many other classic cults, were persecuted and castigated for being too different from the established norms of society, yet it ended up becoming the norm of society. Cults are part of the renewal of culture in society.

We need cults, and the people who join them are very, very normal. My research and others' show they tend to come from very stable backgrounds, [are] intellectually slightly higher than the average and have good educations. And they join for very good reasons. And the reasons they join cults -- and cult brands, as I learned from my research -- are universal reasons to do with the human condition. They join because they want to belong to something, and they want to make meaning. They want to have a reason for being. Those are two very, very simple reasons that all of us in the human race need to express.

This sounds like the opinion of a man who's been involved in a "cult" himself and has convinced himself they're a "good thing." I'd like to know more about Douglas Atkins.

I really liked that Salon article.
It even features one of the guys from the PBS doc.

Clotaire Rapaille.
This guy is a psychiatrist who deals with the "reptilian mind".

[www.pbs.org]
Can marketers really get inside a consumer's head to influence the choice they will make? For market researcher Clotaire Rapaille, the answer is yes. He believes all purchasing decisions really lie beyond conscious thinking and emotion and reside at a primal core in human beings. As chairman of Archetype Discoveries Worldwide, he helps Fortune 500 companies discover the unconscious associations for their products -- the simple "code" -- that will help them sell to consumers: "When you learn a word, whatever it is, 'coffee,' 'love,' 'mother,' there is always a first time. There's a first time to learn everything. The first time you understand, you imprint the meaning of this word; you create a mental connection that you're going to keep using the rest of your life. … So actually every word has a mental highway. I call that a code, an unconscious code in the brain." This interview was conducted on December 15, 2003.

(full interview is here)
[www.pbs.org]

Do you think that, ultimately, people can be figured out?

Part of my theory is that in the human world, nothing happens by chance, nothing. When you see people doing something, there is always a reason why, a code. I don't pretend I know all the codes, but when I work with a client and we try to break the code, then we understand why people do that. Nothing happens by accident in the human world. It's fascinating to try to understand, to break the code.

I'm not telling you that everybody is the same. No, I'm not telling you every human being is the same. It's not that. We are all unique. Even twins are different. Everyone is unique. But we have in common some structures that come from biology. For example, we are all human; we all come from a woman, which is what I call a biological scheme. We all come from a woman, not from a man. OK, so that's a structure. But then after that, we have things that are acquired that come from the culture. But then after that, the third level is your own structure, your identity. And you are unique. Everyone is unique.

So now we have three structures: You have your unique script, what I call personal script; then you have the cultural archetype; then you have the biological scheme. Now let's suppose you are in harmony with these three levels: Then you are happy. Let's suppose there is a disconnect between the three levels: Then you're very unhappy, right? So that the problem comes from the disconnect between you own script -- the way you function as a person -- your culture and your biology. That is a key dimension here. But people's behavior can be understood, definitely. I think that once you understand the power of code, then you can decode. Once you have the code, everything that people do start making sense.


And the codes can be translated into practical marketing strategies.

Yes, and those can be, of course, translated into how to address the real needs of the consumer, which means marketing practice and marketing strategies. For example, if I know that in America the cheese is dead, which means is pasteurized, which means legally dead and scientifically dead, and we don't want any cheese that is alive, then I have to put that up front. I have to say this cheese is safe, is pasteurized, is wrapped up in plastic. I know that plastic is a body bag. You can put it in the fridge. I know the fridge is the morgue; that's where you put the dead bodies. And so once you know that, this is the way you market cheese in America.

I started working with a French company in America, and they were trying to sell French cheese to the Americans. And they didn't understand, because in France the cheese is alive, which means that you can buy it young, mature or old, and that's why you have to read the age of the cheese when you go to buy the cheese. So you smell, you touch, you poke. If you need cheese for today, you want to buy a mature cheese. If you want cheese for next week, you buy a young cheese. And when you buy young cheese for next week, you go home, [but] you never put the cheese in the refrigerator, because you don't put your cat in the refrigerator. It's the same; it's alive. We are very afraid of getting sick with cheese. By the way, more French people die eating cheese than Americans die. But the priority is different; the logic of emotion is different. The French like the taste before safety. Americans want safety before the taste.

One thing I have noticed without exception for Ad-Professionals, is that they ALL seem to say they are "serving society", and are giving people what they want and need.

Obviously, they want to look at themselves in the mirror and feel proud, so they warp their perception of reality to achieve this end.

Also, the money is so tempting.
I know many people who have participated and profited from Ads for products they despise.
But for Ad Professionals, they seem to be totally indoctrinated in the Gospel of Selling With Extreme Prejudice.
Not only are they not ashamed of what they do, they brag about it, and seem to think they are Geniuses.

Coz

Just so you know, Coz: I'm an "ad professional."

Maybe we're not all so bad?

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glam
Just so you know, Coz: I'm an "ad professional."

Maybe we're not all so bad?

What do you think about Wilson Bryan Key?


Ellen

Actually, your statement is perfect.

My "tone" in my criticisms of Ad people, was more satirical and sarcastic.
Does ANY person involved in these enterprises think they are "bad"?
Of course not. They are just doing their job.

Am i a bad person for making money from Ads for products i despise? (like booze) No, not me! If i didn't take the job, then someone else will, right? And i have to pay my bills too, right?
Is it my fault that these Ads make beer seem cool for kids? Nope, i just show up and do my thing...etc.

(This reminds me of the ideas put forward in the recent film, The Corporation). [www.thecorporation.tv]

I think the key point here is that none of us thinks of ourselves as doing things that may be harmful to society. Its just those "other" people who do that.
This frankly applies to most cults as well. It seems to me that most "cults" do believe they are the good people, and us other folks are the evildoers.

A good book about Advertising is "PR by Stuart Ewen".
But i have never met a senior Ad person, or even a lower level Ad person, who didn't think they were doing great things for the world.
But in the end it is all about Persuasion...

Coz

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glam
Just so you know, Coz: I'm an "ad professional."

Maybe we're not all so bad?

Ellen asks:

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What do you think about Wilson Bryan Key?

Oh, I remember learning all about "subliminal seduction" in college....I believed every word of it then.

However, Key has since been debunked by a variety of people.

[www.stayfreemagazine.org]

In my two decades in the ad biz, I've never seen any instance of "subliminal seduction" in the forms Key claimed.

Is there seduction in advertising? You betcha. Do agencies use unusually attractive people and airbrush them to look even better? Yup. Do ad agencies research their target markets and do their best to persuade them to buy a product? Yes. But having been through every step of creating ads from conception through photography through airbrushing through final art (or film), I've never seen "sex" airbrushed into an ice cube or shaving cream reconfigured to look like a naked woman.

It's sort of like cults...there's so much "bad stuff" that's actually true, it's almost doing the public a disservice by sensationalizing things that [b:0f02cc59ec]aren't[/b:0f02cc59ec] true.

Just like people misundertand "brainwashing" by thinking it must involve drugs or beating or implanting electronic devices in someone's brain. The truth is much more insidious and actually more scary to me, because you can control someone's mind with such subtle methods you don't even realize it's happening.

I recommend Cialdini's book, "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion" (which I believe you've read) for an honest look at the ways people manipulate others. Terrific book.

Coz wrote:

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But i have never met a senior Ad person, or even a lower level Ad person, who didn't think they were doing great things for the world.
But in the end it is all about Persuasion...

Well, you've "met" one now. :wink:

Actually, I think the best thing I'm doing right now is trying to warn people away from cults. :D

I just wanted to give a glowing second endorsement of the outstanding documentary The Corporation.
[www.thecorporation.tv]

Can't say enough good things about that movie, simply amazing. I wish they had wider and longer running distribution, but I guess because of the nature of the beast, we've practically allowed our free press to become imprisoned. Time to turn to foreign sources. I also wish they would hurry up the DVD release.

I was suprised to learn from a union executive how commercial radio companies own entire cities. All of chicago's commercial radio is owned by one company. All of LA's commercial radio is owned by Metro News. Clear Channel the apparent monopoly- is actually the minority and competition of Metro. You'd never think it- they give each individual station the appearence of being it's own entity- but in the end they're all embeded under one big monopolistic owner per city. That means you get your commercial radio news ALL from the same source (excluding public radio, I think). You can change the channel, but you can't change the spin. Not that I ever liked Rush pillpopper Limba in the first place.