Ads and school

Somehow our society has come to be jaded by all the ads that are shown everywhere. Ask a some students if they are having a hard time memorizing some notes for a class and you will probably get an earful about how it sucks to memorize all the stuff. Then ask them what the catchphrase or latest commercial is for a product and they probably would know it right off the bat. Croissant makes a good point about the growth that a student does during college, “Students are developing their identities, and that includes brand and lifestyle identities as well as the disciplinary and occupational identities that are the focus of faculty work. (82)” This means that the companies want students to be able to access their product easily so they may build a loyalty to that brand. Companies want to have the students have fond memories associated with their product. Unfortunately because these companies are not actually interested in helping the university, even though it may seem that way, greed seems to play a large role in what is advertized on campus. There seem to be monopolies forming in advertizing in universities because to have two different soda brands advertizing would be a conflict of interest. But whose interest? Certainly not the students who probably prefer a certain brand of soda, but are not strictly dedicated to one or the other. All of the advertisements that we see give us the right to make a decision about who gets our money. If we are only able to see one option on campus, then there really isn’t a choice for us.

This episode of Clone High is about how a corporate sponsor influences a school election. A highlight is at 5:20 to 5:56.