Advertising is no more dead than the printing press, with its seemingly antiquated chain of production — from felling trees and sending logs downriver to pulping that lumber in paper mills that belch smoke and breathe fire — so boxes of pages may reach publishers and proof editors, and bear the imprint of typesetters and machinists, until those ink-stained wretches — readers and writers alike — can fold their newspapers, bookmark their novels and dog-ear their detective stories, and highlight the tomes of their favorite authors and carry the memoirs of their beloved statesmen.
There is no “off switch,” save closing your eyes in the real world, to billboards, neon signposts and flashing marquees.
There are no sunglasses dark enough, and there are no headphones strong enough, to blind you from the sight of — and to deafen your ears to the sounds of — the luminescent lights of Times Square, and the nearby horns and hollers — as well as the screeching taxis and squealing tourists — that characterize this audiovisual extravaganza.
Would you dim the Golden Arches of McDonald’s, and empty the bulbs or remove the pixels of Coca-Cola’s Dynamic Ribbon, while you try to silence cabs and hush pedestrians by issuing them tickets for ruining your definition of excitement?
Would you disrupt the high voltage of the Las Vegas Strip with a permanent blackout, reducing Caesars Palace to its literal namesake — a premodern residence of rank odor and rotten food, of primitive ice cellars and flickering candelabras?
Would you censor any and all advertising, including the best of this commercial art, which can elicit emotional responses from viewers — driving them to weep, in sorrow, or cry, in love and triumph, on behalf of peace and victory — so a message of substance may reach them through a medium of style?
Your postmortem to the contrary, this body is very much alive.
