I was on a break from work, walking up Johnson St. Working at a Sally-Anne shelter I sometimes marvel at the contrast between my work environment and the trendy boutiques that line the sides of Johnson. I was in that state on this break, it’s after 5 on a Sunday, and you can more or less murder in the street for want of watchful eyes. Then my eyes fall into one of these store windows, to behold thirty people in one of these trendy stores, there hands clasped in nameste.
Now I'm picky about most things. I'm a beer snob, food snob, coffee snob, etc., but I'm especially snobbish when it comes to those things that pertain to the care of the soul. These are not half-way matters. I believe that function fallows form, and that the soul correspondences to the boundaries we set upon it - so - when I see a large group of young woman practicing mediation in a retail chain store my alarm bells start ringing.
That said: Hats off to Lulu lemon man. They've done it. They’ve achieved the level of product integration that ad men have wet dreams of. Lulu Lemon is no longer just a store, it’s a temple. A place of practice for those who are looking to be spiritual - not religious. This is exactly the type of pseudo-spirituality that Naomi Kelin warned us of when she heralded the dangerous of “lifestyle branding” in No Logo. The commodity is not the clothes, it’s the community.
Kevin Robert has realized this, and he’s taking it to the next level. He’s the marketing guru who has devised the formula to win over your soul (I mean this in a very real way). His book, Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands, argues that brands need a special mixture of Intimacy, Sensuality, and Mystery to gather the love and respect of the consumer.
I cannot over emphasis the immense perversion that is taking place here. Immense because he is ultimately arguing that Cheerios will provide the same sustenance as the Church. Robert’s wants the next generation of ad men to construct symphonies of lies, stories he calls them, stories to give the consumer a place within the mythology of the commodity, a community of belonging.
As Christians we have the same practice in the World, we tell stories, stories that Jesus told us and that we tell other people. We have a narrative that instructs us on how to live in the World and it is from these gospels, and the practice of the sacraments, we step into the Lord’s peace. And it’s a far safer and securer peace than anything an ad man can come up with.
Marshall McCullen knew that. After pioneering the field of media studies, the parable that McCullen was fond of using was likening advertising to Edgar Allan Poe’s story A Descent into the Maelstrom; where a man lashes himself to a heavy chest as he is sucked up into a hurricane. McCullen, who was a devout Catholic, argued that as the maelstrom of advertising grows around us we too need to be fastened to something so that we will not be blown helter skelter by the winds of market fancy. This is one thing that makes me grateful for my faith with men like Robert at work, in that it shelters me from these winds, as it binds me to the World.
Now I'm picky about most things. I'm a beer snob, food snob, coffee snob, etc., but I'm especially snobbish when it comes to those things that pertain to the care of the soul. These are not half-way matters. I believe that function fallows form, and that the soul correspondences to the boundaries we set upon it - so - when I see a large group of young woman practicing mediation in a retail chain store my alarm bells start ringing.
That said: Hats off to Lulu lemon man. They've done it. They’ve achieved the level of product integration that ad men have wet dreams of. Lulu Lemon is no longer just a store, it’s a temple. A place of practice for those who are looking to be spiritual - not religious. This is exactly the type of pseudo-spirituality that Naomi Kelin warned us of when she heralded the dangerous of “lifestyle branding” in No Logo. The commodity is not the clothes, it’s the community.
Kevin Robert has realized this, and he’s taking it to the next level. He’s the marketing guru who has devised the formula to win over your soul (I mean this in a very real way). His book, Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands, argues that brands need a special mixture of Intimacy, Sensuality, and Mystery to gather the love and respect of the consumer.
I cannot over emphasis the immense perversion that is taking place here. Immense because he is ultimately arguing that Cheerios will provide the same sustenance as the Church. Robert’s wants the next generation of ad men to construct symphonies of lies, stories he calls them, stories to give the consumer a place within the mythology of the commodity, a community of belonging.
As Christians we have the same practice in the World, we tell stories, stories that Jesus told us and that we tell other people. We have a narrative that instructs us on how to live in the World and it is from these gospels, and the practice of the sacraments, we step into the Lord’s peace. And it’s a far safer and securer peace than anything an ad man can come up with.
Marshall McCullen knew that. After pioneering the field of media studies, the parable that McCullen was fond of using was likening advertising to Edgar Allan Poe’s story A Descent into the Maelstrom; where a man lashes himself to a heavy chest as he is sucked up into a hurricane. McCullen, who was a devout Catholic, argued that as the maelstrom of advertising grows around us we too need to be fastened to something so that we will not be blown helter skelter by the winds of market fancy. This is one thing that makes me grateful for my faith with men like Robert at work, in that it shelters me from these winds, as it binds me to the World.
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