So before I take my Little Bottle Openers and Madam for luncheon, allow me to present another couple of articles looking at stuff in the Philippines...
Intellectual Attainment.It is postulated that many Filipinos (obviously not my dear friends up Immigration, or fellow P38 owners) stop developing mentally at the age of 12*. And the reason for this theory?
Well, there’s an advert on TV for a milk supplement, aimed at, it would appear, pre-teens. It tells (with the aid of a dance) of how drinking this stuff helps them with “…the 8 Signs of Brain Development,” which apparently are;
Memory – learning and remembering (They never learn that graft holds the country back and keep forgetting they will, “Stamp out corruption” immediately after every election)
Vocabulary – Building a library of words (“Putang ina mo” trips lightly and regularly off the lips of many, and at any opportunity. Everyone’s a son of a whore it would seem, but not much else. So, a small library then)
Attention – shifting focus from one concept to another (Facebook…TV, Facebook…TV, Facebook…)
Language Skills – communication (See ‘Vocabulary’ and ‘Regulated Behaviour’)
Strategy & Planning – problem solving and task execution (Under Duterte, with a strategic Colt .45, mainly. Literally, task is execution – problem is solved)
Regulated Behaviour – understanding emotions and control of reactions (Shouting, “Putang ina mo” a lot, fighting and crying, just like they do in TV dramas)
Inhibitory Control – resisting impulses (I reckon spitting out unaffordable babies like grape pips answers that one)
Listening Comprehension – understanding words and expressions (La, la, la, la,…)
This is the case for the prosecution, m’lud, and not only that, our next feature will prove it.
*A colleague reckons it’s actually eight-years-old, but we can take that with a pinch of salt, as they haven’t done the profound level of research like what we done.
AdvertisingIn order to support the age hypothesis, let’s see if television advertising in the Philippines is targeted to the average mentality of the population.
Conclusion? It is.
There’s nothing clever or slick; people dressed up as soap packets or bleach bottles dance around whilst amazed looking housewives, clutching their squeaky clean plates and searingly white t-shirts, look on.
There are only six* products in TV adverts:-
Milk supplements for kids. Probably the most numerous and all show that if you really wish to be a bad mother and don’t give them to your child, they will grow up to be a drooling, gibbering idiot and can look forward to a career as a Jeepney driver. Most ads involve allegedly hyper-intelligent children who are that brainy, they dance badly.
Cleaning products (household); must include a sweaty fat child, whose chronic personal hygiene problems are masked by washing his clothes in New, Improved, Sudso, now with Added Smellbegone. Or a ladyboy demonstrating to an astonished family how many hundreds of plates 1cc of Super, New Formula, Disho will clean. All product types involve dancing. Often a song as well.
Hair products; many offering straightening properties to a nation filled with women whose hair is resolutely straight. Often involves dancing, with swishing hair.
Deodorant; unfortunately the above fat child has obviously missed these. Amazingly, not much dancing, but lots of sniffing around each other, whilst wearing rapt expressions. Bit like the old Bisto gravy adverts. Or dogs.
Sanitary towels; where a herd of girls dance around with lots of high kicks, whilst wearing white jeans, just to prove a point. Involves dancing (obvs). Just thank God they don’t advertise toilet tissue.
Alcohol; the latest Emperador brandy one has a macho looking guy marching through Manila, bottle in hand, whilst people drop whatever they are doing to follow him, Pied Piper style. Once all commerce, industry, healthcare and traffic in the capital have presumably ground to a halt, everyone in the thousands strong horde takes a slug. Doubtless, all then return to work, lashed. The last words on the screen are “Drink Responsibly”! No dancing.
All beer adverts involve dancing and singing – just need fighting to be like the real thing. Also end with “Drink Responsibly”. Nobody ever does.
*Actually, there’s more – food being a main one. However, these are identical, all showing people swooning over whatever the product is, followed by a little dance.
Have a great weekend
