ADVERT exploits climate change to sell shit : Melbourne Indymedia

Waiting for my tram today I had to stop myself (unsuccessfully) from adding some extra poetry to the government anti-terrorism propaganda campaign in the Ad-Shell. So anyway, when the tram arrived I was treated to the above image of a sexy babe pouring water down the throat of this guy wearing diesel clothes on top of a tall building which was surrounded by massive sea level rise.

GLOBAL WARMING READY was the text which I can only imagine is trying to convince fashion victims that if they purchased these GM cotton threads they would not become climate victims.

The Advertising Agency who produced this campaign must have done their million dollar research. Did they discover that people just don't care about climate change?

Here is another article about the campaign:

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Diesel Threads and Global Warming - Together at Last!

Paris is covered in jungle. St. Mark’s Square in Venice is overrun with tropical birds. Manhatten’s skyscrapers are nearly submerged by flooding. South Dakota is covered in palm trees and Mount Rushmore is now part of a lake. But you, darling, look fabulous.

Welcome to the Diesel Clothing Company’s Global Warming Ready marketing campaign. In each of these Photo-shopped scenes of a post-global warming planet you’ve got sexy European models racing around in speed-boats, rubbing each other with suntan lotion, shopping, stuff like that.

The TV ad, due out in April, starts with a doc reel about global warming with scary disaster footage. Then, in capital letters: “HOLD ON! GLOBAL WARMING CANNOT STOP OUR LIVES!” Straight to nightclub scenes, and a shuffle of the above pictures. Party like it was 1999.

According to a Diesel press release, the campaign is “designed to ignite debate while raising awareness of the issues surrounding climate change.” It may also have a tiny little bit to do with selling Diesel clothes.

Debate has definitely been ignited. Some people are mad at Diesel for making environmental catastrophe look like a day at the beach. Other people are saying get a life, it’s ironic, and at least they’re talking about climate, right?

Diesel is known for its weird, sexy, attention-getting ads, which always pick the hottest button in the room, and whack it with the biggest mallet.

Diesel describes its spin on climate change as one that “portrays the potential look of this new world while representing it in an aesthetically beautiful way.” Climate change as eye candy? Is that so bad? The design values are amazing, the models are definitely aesthetic, and the parrots are nice.

The pictures are maybe not so realistic. If global warming causes the Atlantic Gulfstream to shut down – like in ‘The Day After Tomorrow” – and Northern Europe flash-freezes, don’t go boating off the English coast in a micro-mini. You’d think it would be great if pretty tropical birds would come and replace pigeons – but invasive species, as they’re called, could also bring along the next SARS while they’re wiping out the local food chain. The way the ozone layer has been going you maybe don’t want to go tanning on a skyscraper. And check out footage of New Orleans to find out how attractive coastal flooding really is.

But okay, let’s not hate Diesel’s future just because it’s beautiful.

To its credit, Diesel’s website component of the ad includes, “Ten things you can do to stop Global Warming”, and a link to stopglobalwarming.org. Diesel is also directing people to Al Gore’s ‘An Inconvenient Truth’. Diesel’s new headquarters in Italy will be built to meet all the Kyoto requirements, and they have been slowly eliminating chemicals from their washing process. This doesn’t make them the Suzuki Foundation, but they’re not the worst apples.

We’re probably going to see more ads of this kind in the near future. As the environment becomes more hip you’re likely to see more companies talking up global warming for the sake of the cool.

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"The problem, of course, is that the ads are encouraging people to participate in cycles of disposal which represent, on an ecological level, some of the most fundamental crises of contemporary life."

Stuart Ewen
Hunter College, author, Captains of Consciousness
(from "The Ad and the Ego" available from ACME)