Hilarious, Harrowing Geico Commercial

The Super Bowl commercials will generate a great deal of commentary this week, but while watching the golf tournament today, I saw the Geico "Ew, Seriously, So Gross" commercial, featuring the middle school "popular girls."

On the surface, the commercial is utterly hilarious. It juxtaposes the stereotypical "doofus" Dad, who begins an innovative weight loss program. To prevent himself from eating, he has the popular/mean girls follow him around. They comment (well, more of a sneer really) whenever he attempts to eat, whether it is a late night sandwich or waffles slathered in strawberries and whipped cream. In rapid succession, the girls drip with sarcasm: "Ew, Seriously, So Gross"

The commercial works so well, because the young female actors playing the middle schoolers nail it. The looks, the tone, and even snapping a photo when the man is at his most vulnerable (all alone in his car outside a burger joint, taking in a giant mouthful, and ending with mustard on his face) all work the comedic angle wonderfully.

Looking below the surface, however, a different set of messages emerge that are much more disturbing (isn't this so often the case with popular culture?). Two jump out quickly:

• The "popular/mean girls" stereotype is alive and well in America's schools and anything that glorifies that image is game for criticism. While the older man asks for this, his facial expressions and reactions to their barbs obviously open past wounds. 

• The "typical" man presented is frumpy, lacks self-esteem, and unwilling to take wiser steps toward weight loss. In addition, the simple fact that he employs this scheme proves that he must not be that intelligent.

The commercial as a whole promotes both the self-flagellation and status-consciousness that serve as pillars of contemporary culture. On one hand, the man beats himself up for not looking the way culture demands. Second, he elevates the "popular" middle school girls over his "average" status.

The man also presents his case via a pseudo-documentary setting, much like the ones modern audiences have grown accustomed to by television shows such as The Office. Although the man's story is one centered on self-disgust and embarrassment, he holds higher status than the (real life) viewer because he is on television.

Author Chris Hedges discusses the broader consequences of this thinking in Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle, saying:

Celebrity culture plunges us into a moral voice. No one has any worth beyond his or her appearance, usefulness, or ability to 'succeed.' The highest achievements in a celebrity culture are wealth, sexual conquest, and fame. (32)

What corporations like Geico do not seem to understand is that there are signs and signals being sent via advertising and other mass communication channels that have unintended consequences. The simple response is "it is just a commercial." I would argue, however, harmlessness flies out the window when stereotypes are at the heart of the message.

Steve Jobs Hagiography is Not Good History

Kaila Colbin wrote an interesting blog at MediaPost's Online Spin: The Productive Narcissism Of Steve Jobs. At the heart of the article is a plea for bosses to not attempt to emulate Steve Jobs or Henry Ford -- both notorious "asshole" bosses -- but rather to understand that good people can also be great managers.

She explains:

"Jobs and Ford were tyrants because they were visionary, because of their internal dissonance between reality and possibility. If you do not suffer from this dissonance, no amount of bad behavior towards your colleagues will turn you into a visionary. And I believe it’s entirely possible to be a visionary and to be kind."

This is the kind of message I think bosses and potential bosses need to read...maybe two or three times. Too often, those in charge assume that with enough bluster and bullying they will seem like leaders. Want proof, ask everyone you know if they have ever had an asshole boss. Depending on your mindset, you will be amazed at the response.

While I agree with the post in regards to managing people, I think there's a challenge in equating Jobs and Ford.

In response to Kaila's post, I commented:

"A challenge, historically, though is in using Jobs and Ford as the models here. Ford, despite his shortcomings as a person/boss, built a system that revolutionized business. For all the hagiography about Jobs, the iPod, iPad, etc., can hardly be thought about the same way. Perhaps Jobs would have done something more important with his power and creativity had he lived a longer life, but I don't see how we hail him for making consumer goods that exist merely to get people to purchase them. The root of evil in Jobs' case is narcissism and money. He felt entitled to act the way he did b/c he was too big for anyone to stand up to him. Perhaps history will some day view him as the world's worst boss than some kind of creative genius for creating consumer goods that have no societal value."

Yes, people love their Macs, iPhones, iPods, iPads, etc., but can we get past turning Jobs into a saint for creating basically worthless consumer goods? As such, there is no feasible way to compare Ford and Jobs on historical importance.

The eminent historian Gordon Wood recently commented about the value of having a historical mindset, saying, "To get our bearings, to get our directions, we need to know where we've been." He added, "Without knowing history, one is living in a two-dimensional world, not experiencing reality as it ought to be experienced."

Jobs hagiography is not good history.

Featured Speakers Examine Cult Pop Culture; the Idea in Pop Culture Analysis

FEATURED SPEAKERS EXAMINE CULT POP CULTURE; THE IDEA IN POP CULTURE ANALYSIS

MidwestPopular Culture/American Culture Association Brings Hundreds of Scholars and Enthusiasts to Milwaukee

(Milwaukee) October 14, 2011 – Popular culture enthusiasts from across the Midwest and the nation will gather in Milwaukee October 14-16, 2011, at the 2011 joint Midwest Popular Culture/Midwest American Culture Association Annual Conference at the Milwaukee Hilton City Center. Some 120 panels will examine topics across the popular culture universe, from Mad Men and Harry Potter to Twilight and Facebook.

Two featured speakers address the conference on Friday, October 14, from 5:15 to 6:45 p.m.

-- Bob Batchelor, an assistant professor in the School ofJournalism and Mass Communication at Kent State University, talks about “Cult Pop Culture: How the Fringe Became Mainstream” in Wright Ballroom A.

-- John Jordan, associate professor in the Department ofCommunication at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, discusses “The Idea, and Its Importance in Analyzing Popular Culture” in Wright Ballroom C.

Batchelor’s presentation focuses on the 3-volume edited anthology Cult Pop Culture: How theFringe Became Mainstream (Preager), published later this year. The anthology is the first dedicated to the quirky, offbeat aspects of American popular culture that people have loved, enjoyed, (and in some cases) worshiped over the last 50 years. By examining the (often seedy) people and subjects we hold most dear, this collection offers deep insights into what Americans think, feel, and cherish.

Jordan’s talk reveals his interest in those moments when ideas and material circumstances come together in a way that requires communities to make sense of the situation. These are the moments when someone has to interpret, or declare, or reach out – moments of meaningful and material communication. Jordan’s work seeks an understanding of how such situations are arrived at, how their meaning is contested and understood, and what implications arise for how we see ourselves in modern society.

About the Midwest Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association

The Midwest Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (MPCA/ACA) is a regional branch of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association. The organization held its first conference in Duluth, Minnesota, in 1973. After a hiatus during the 1990s, the organization held a comeback conference in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 2002. MPCA/ACA usually holds its annual conference in a large Midwestern city. Anyone is welcome to join and submit proposals for consideration at the MPCA/ACA conference. Membership in MPCA/ACA is by no means limited to those working or living in the Midwest or even the United States. In fact, presenters have come from as far away as Florida and California, and Norway and Australia. Visit http://www.mpcaaca.org for more information about the organization and how to join. Also, follow #MidwestPCA for updates and conversation streaming live from the conference.

About Bob Batchelor

Bob Batchelor (Ph.D., University of South Florida) is an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Kent State University and academic coordinator of its online M.A. program in public relations. Batchelor is the author or editor of 10 books, including: The 1900s; The 1980s; The 2000s; and American Pop: Popular Culture Decade by Decade. He has published in Radical History Review, The Journal of American Culture, The Mailer Review, The American Prospect Online, and Public Relations Review. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of The Journal of Popular Culture and Pop Culture Universe: Icons, Idols, Ideas (ABC-CLIO). Batchelor’s current research includes books on John Updike, Bob Dylan, and the rubber industry in World War II. He is also editing two anthologies with KSU colleague Danielle Coombs: We Are What We Sell: How Advertising Shapes American Life…And Always Has and American History through American Sports. He can be reached at rpbatche@kent.edu.

About John Jordan

John W. Jordan (Ph.D., University of Georgia) is an associate professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee. He studies pressing issues in contemporary society using critical rhetorical analysis. Jordan’s research program centers typically on how technology interacts with public sensibilities, and how subaltern groups use rhetoric to engage authoritative control. His scholarly goal is to help others appreciate the wider possibilities of their involvement in society. Jordan’s recent scholarship has appeared in Quarterly Journal of Speech, Critical Studies in Media Communication, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies, and Flow. He can be contacted at jjdordan@uwm.edu.

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Pop Culture Musings: From College Football to Keith Richards

The start of the new academic school year and launch of college football season provides an interesting confluence of popular culture events.

Here are some random thoughts:

I am watching the University of South Florida stick it to Notre Dame (16-0 at the half). As usual, ND is overrated and USF is playing well in the early season. It is a hot day in South Bend, Indiana, but what is with all the USF players' helmets coming off? Given the risk of concussions among these young athletes, is is surprising that it is happening so frequently.

[Coincidently, I taught many of the USF starters while still at the school, since one of my primary assignments was to teach the large lecture course "Mass Comm and Society," which ranged from around 225 to 450 students per class, depending on the semester. B.J. Daniels, for example, now a heralded quarterback, was a thoughtful and smiling Freshman when he took the class one summer. I am glad to see him doing so well.]

One of the first NBC commercials during the telecast -- besides the annoying ever-present NBC logo in either the upper right hand or lower left of the screen -- attempts to entice viewers to watch the new show Whitney, starring comedian Whitney Cummings. I do not make my living analyzing television shows, but I would bet the meager savings I have in the bank that the show is going to tank.

The NBC website, already declares Cummings "TV's hottest new star," which is interesting, since the first show hasn't aired yet. Rather than just go with my gut on this one, I put my faith in Tim Goodman of The Hollywood Reporter, who has seen the pilot and says, "all that forced laughter on Whitney -- canned or 'live' it makes no difference -- seems jarringly out of place." Sure, running after The Office will guarantee a sizable audience, but a show built around a smart-ass, overly sarcastic twenty-something really does not have a built in audience.

Although I have little time for "pleasure" reading, I could not pass up diving into Keith Richards' Life when I saw it on the New Book shelf at our phenomenal public library Stow-Munroe Falls Public Library. Since I read it, the book has surpassed the 1 million sales mark, establishing it as one of the best-selling rock memoirs of all time, according to Rolling Stone magazine.

Although Life is an interesting look at how a poor British kid becomes the lead guitarist of one of the greatest bands of all-time, what struck me is the amount of brazen violence Richards discusses. Throughout the memoir, he discusses flashing a knife or pulling out a gun, usually to get someone's attention. The amazing thing is not that Keith is still alive, but rather that he never accidently killed someone.

I thought that the violence, particularly for no good reason at all, might just be braggadocio, but then in Peter Wolf's essay in According to the Rolling Stones, he tells a story about Keith pulling a "bowie knife" on a DJ at a Stones party for their road crew. After the DJ played one too many disco tunes, the guitarist "walked slowly up to the DJ booth, smiled at the disc jockey, grabbed him by the neck...put it [the knife] right up to the DJ's throat and gave him his final warning" (239).

Also, in both Life and According to, Charlie Watts is depicted as settling arguments by throwing sucker punches, one at Mick Jagger and the other at Wolf. The question is why all this random violence? One line of thinking may be that once a person achieves a certain level of fame, they no longer believe that rules apply to them. If one is willing to give Richards and Watts the benefit of the doubt, then maybe these are just isolated incidents in otherwise well-lived lives.

Finally, as I sit here and obsess about popular culture, what really turns my stomach is the upbeat commercials for financial institutions that were so instrumental in sparking and promulgating the financial crisis of the past several years. Chase, for example, is pushing banking that it deems, "smarter, faster, and easier."

Try selling that message to the countless people whose credit has been destroyed when Chase cut the limit on their credit cards for no other reason than to make it seem as if they were maxed out. This financial duplicity automatically hurts a person's score, because they have less available credit overall. One person I know paid his card on time and paid down the balance, but when the balance hit a lower number, Chase dropped the maximum to that lower figure.

Is Lady Gaga a Joke, Or, Will Every Generation Need a Madonna Clone?

Although this post might offend all the "little monsters" out there, the more of Lady Gaga's schtick I see, the more it seems like nothing more than rehashed Madonna, slightly updated for the 2010s.

This comparison became really evident in watching the HBO Lady Gaga concert special the other night after not catching it when it debuted last May.

Aspects of LG directly appropriated from Madonna:

• A multitude of androgynous dancers, primarily decked out in leather with props accentuating their genitals/nether regions/etc. See below:

via Flickr/TJ Sengel

via Flickr/Crazy-Heart

• Emphasis on costume changes, rather than musical quality.

• Dramatic, onstage appeals to disenfranchised audience members, including homosexuals, outsiders, loners, and others. In fact, by labeling these audiences as "little monsters," Gaga is actually out-Madonna-ing Madonna, creating a tighter bond between herself and her fans.

From a historical perspective, Gaga is just another in a long line of performers who continually change persona, looks, and actions to appeal to fans. The difference between these earlier artists, however, is that Gaga operates in a culture that demands this change faster -- as if each costume change provides her with an additional opportunity to reinvent herself.

In the current environment, year-to-year or album-to-album change is too slow. For Gaga and the next iteration of her, and the next iteration of her, transformation before a fickle audience occupies the blink of an eye.


Sitting on the couch watching the HBO concert, my wife asked, "Don't they realize that Madonna already did all this stuff decades ago?" Unfortunately, the answer is that they don't. Historical context is in short supply in today's culture, a sad fact that most popular culture enthusiasts must face.

Without historical insight, therefore, "Mother Monster" seems new and fresh, even though it seems little more than a direct ripoff of "The Material Girl," simply delivered to a new generation of fans.

Four Years Later...A Virtual Lifetime...And, Revamping a Blog

Pop Goes Our Culture sat dormant, though somewhere in the back of my mind, for the last four years. It is hard to believe the amazing changes the world has gone through in that time. Same for me and my family.

Some things, however, do not seem all that different. Even seemingly earth-shattering events are swallowed into the relentless churn. This idea seems at the heart of American popular culture. Almost everyone has a shot at glory and on the rise and fall charts, if one crashes down, they too get more opportunities to regain their status. Many of our most cherished icons have made careers of riding this roller-coaster (even after death), such as Elvis, Madonna, Marilyn Monroe, and Bob Dylan.

Let's jump on the way-back train and revisit some popular culture highlights of 2007 when I last posted to Pop Goes Our Culture:

• On July 21, 2007, the final book in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, came out, selling some 8.3 million copies in its first 24 hours in the United States. Potter-mania swept the nation with countless children and adults dressing like Harry, standing in line to get the book, and then staying up all night in an effort to reach the end.

• Just a few days before that last post, on August 7, 2007, Barry Bonds passed Hammerin’ Hank Aaron as baseball’s all-time home run king.

• Perhaps one of the oddest bits of news to emerge from the summer of 2007 was when Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick drew indefinite suspension after he admitted to several atrocities related to dogfighting. After facing an incredible fall from grace, Vick ended up in jail. 

Here we are four years later, and many of these distant blips on the pop culture radar are still with us in one form or another.

For example, Vick has transformed from dog-killer and criminal to starting quarterback of the Philadelphia Eagles. The more wins Vick chalks up, the faster he regains his former status among pro football's elite and as a celebrity pitchman. The film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows: Part 2 -- as everyone with a pulse knows -- is poised to become one of the rare blockbusters to reach the $1 billion revenue mark worldwide. All these years later, the Bonds saga continues with some end in sight, but after millions of dollars were wasted in pursuing perjury charges against the San Francisco Giants.

Teachers often lament that their lives speed by via the school calendar. I am no different with each piece bitten off in semester chunks and four-year spans. It has been a traditional college degree time frame since I last posted here, but now I'm back. Hopefully, better (and wiser) than ever.

Scott Baio is 45...and an Idiot!

I admit that I am a reality television junkie. If you want proof, read my 2002 essay written about the sleazy Alex Michel of early "The Bachelor" fame, which was anthologized in the new reader: Pop Perspective: Readings to Critique Contemporary Culture, edited by the wonderful Laura Gray-Rosendale (McGraw-Hill, 2008). I love the Gene Simmons and Kathy Griffin reality shows and my wife can't get enough of "So You Think You Can Dance."

What I do not like is the third generation ludicrous reality shows that now dominate much of the genre, such as the Flavor Flav show and its spin-offs and others that focus on getting b-list celebrities to do stupid things on camera. Therefore, you will never catch me watching an iteration of "The Surreal Life" or anything starring Poison front man Bret Michaels.

As lame and unwatchable as many of these lame show are -- let's call them "celeb faux-tainment" -- none of them seem as offensive to me as "Scott Baio is 45...and Single." After watching a handful of episodes, I can't help but get angry -- at myself for tuning in. [Has anyone figured out a way to get those wasted hours of life back?]

This isn't the place for a recap, but the premise is that Scott Baio wants to settle down, marry, and have a family after a life of celebrity singledom and he can't figure out why he has never been married. In an attempt to figure himself out, Baio hires a life coach (Doc Ali) to help him get to the bottom of the conundrum.

What unfolds is the portrait of a sitcom star as perpetual actor. Baio half-asses it through the assignments the life coach gives him and wonders why all the ex-girlfriends he's had basically hate him. [A clue: dude, you cheated on every one of them with some other high-profile celebrity] Baio is so caught up being "Scott Baio, celebrity bachelor" that he does not possess the basic humanity that exists somewhere deep in the hearts of most people. He has no idea what makes him tick because he is playing a role, rather than living a life.

Adding to Baio's "challenges" is a handful of hangers-on who perpetuate the worst parts of his personality for their own gain/amusement. What nebish 40-something nobody in Hollywood wouldn't want Baio as a friend and at least have the chance to catch some of his castoffs? From the episodes that have aired, it seems that he and his friend/groupies do little more each day than smoke cigars, play golf, and travel to Vegas for good times.

The most entertaining part of each show is watching Baio's look of shock as a different aspect of his personality is picked apart by an ex-girlfriend or Doc Ali. As a viewer, one sits there wondering, "this guy can't really be this obtuse, can he?" The second funniest clip is when he declares that he isn't a mean guy and didn't do anything "malicious" to any of the women from his past, that him cheating, being noncommittal, etc. was "just me being me." Maybe "train wreck television" is a better name for shows like the ones featuring Baio, Michaels, or any of Flavor Flav's "ladies."

The irony is that millions of people watch reality television each week to escape the real reality of day to day life in modern America. It is much easier to watch Scott Baio or "American Idol" than worry about American kids getting blown up in Iraq or starving people living under a freeway overpass.

When it comes to thinking about popular culture, the best bet is to look to the words of Ray B. Browne, professor emeritus of popular culture studies at Bowling Green State University, who has spent a lifetime examining the field. He says, "United States popular culture is ourselves and our country, and we, for better or worse, are our popular culture."

Perhaps this quote raises more questions than it answers, but it is a great jumping off point for deeper thinking about why we turn to pop culture in times of national crisis.