Which of the following people would you say is the most admirable:
Mother Teresa, Bill Gates or Norman Borlaug?
Borlaug, father of the “Green Revolution” that used agricultural
science to reduce world hunger, has been credited with saving a billion
lives, more than anyone else in history. Gates, in deciding what to do
with his fortune, crunched the numbers and determined that he could
alleviate the most misery by fighting everyday scourges in the
developing world like malaria, diarrhea
and parasites. Mother Teresa, for her part, extolled the virtue of
suffering and ran her well-financed missions accordingly: their sick
patrons were offered plenty of prayer but harsh conditions, few analgesics and dangerously primitive medical care.
The human moral sense turns out to be an organ of considerable
complexity, with quirks that reflect its evolutionary history and its
neurobiological foundations.
Dozens of things that past generations treated as practical matters
are now ethical battlegrounds, including disposable diapers, I.Q.
tests, poultry farms, Barbie dolls and research on breast cancer. Food alone has become a minefield, with critics sermonizing about the size of sodas, the chemistry of fat,
the freedom of chickens, the price of coffee beans, the species of fish
and now the distance the food has traveled from farm to plate.
That said...Many of these moralizations, like the assault on smoking, may be
understood as practical tactics to reduce some recently identified
harm. But whether an activity flips our mental switches to the “moral”
setting isn’t just a matter of how much harm it does. We don’t show
contempt to the man who fails to change the batteries in his smoke
alarms or takes his family on a driving vacation, both of which
multiply the risk they will die in an accident. Driving a gas-guzzling
Hummer is reprehensible (hence Hummer HX), but driving a gas-guzzling old Volvo is not;
eating a Big Mac is unconscionable, but not imported cheese or crème
brûlée. The reason for these double standards is obvious: people tend
to align their moralization with their own lifestyles.
Read the whole story.
(Photo: Dr. Norman Borlaug, in his wrestling attire as a young man.)
I am constantly integrating a cinema perspective to the way I plan brands. In speaking on the topic of brand placement and integration in consumer experience, I described the process of managing these new strategies as similar in how one manages the career/brand of a good character actor. The example I have used in the past was Christian Bale, but an interview with Alec Baldwin on 60 minutes this Sunday made the connection for me again. It was something he said. Good character acting is.. "learning to listen to the other actors". I think this says a lot. How often do brands imagine themselves as the leading man - only to realize that this position leaves them looking like a hollow talking head and disconnected from the scenes they wish to live in. Brands need to channel the authenticity that comes from listening - the art of character acting - and cultivate a meaningful position in the mise-en-scene. That is the formula for better experiences.
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