Okay... I'll admit... I haven't seen the Verizon ad with the ferret.
I don't know if it is good or bad, shows ferrets in a good light, or in
a bad light.  But this issue got me thinking about how advertising in
general affects us all.  Maybe not all the time with every product, but
it does affect us all.
 
Let's look at what Disney has done for animals in the last few decades...
they taught us that lemmings commit suicide by throwing themselves off
cliffs to keep their own numbers down.  I still recall how many times I
repeated that fact to my friends when I was a child.  Now, thankfully, I
know better.  They showed us that Dalmatians were the dogs of choice with
the outcome of 101 Dalmatians and all the subsequent merchandise.  And
shelters filled with Dalmatians after each of their movies and promotions
was long forgotten.  Take any animal spotlighted in a movie and the
result is always the same... Remember Beethoven?  It was the same with
St. Bernard's.
 
But advertisers know that they can push not only good feelings on people
with animals, but they can do the same in reverse, making people afraid
of the water, like the movie Jaws did decades ago.  How many of us are
still afraid to go into the water at a beach?  The fear of sharks created
by one movie alone resulted in an all out war on sharks - any kind of
shark - and hundreds of thousands died because of created fear and
hysteria.  Again, now I know differently and am more informed.
 
Advertisers are quite aware of the power they hold when they put an ad
on TV that depicts a product either in a good light (their product),
or in a bad light (the competitor's product).  But aside from all that,
it is not always the product that is remembered but what is in the
commercial itself.  Try to think of 10 commercials you like right now and
ask yourself what you remember most about them.  Is it the actual product
or do you recall something else in the commercial?  Most people recall
something in the commercial.  Because my career is related to
advertising, I tend to remember the product as well.  But I am not in the
majority.  I also scrutinize commercials as to what they are saying and
what they are selling.  I also rate commercials into success or failure
categories.
 
One of my most hated commercials is for a well known national brand of
coffee.  The commercial opens with a couple getting a puppy from the pet
store window and taking it home.  Each subsequent scene shows the couple
forgiving the puppy for massive damage to the house it has created.  Each
time the couple just laughs and shrugs it off.  The last scene is the
puppy standing amongst strewn coffee grinds with the last shot of the
couple returning the puppy to the pet shop window.  For those of you
who may have seen the new version of the ad, the end shot of the couple
returning the dog has been cut.
 
What the ad blatantly told the viewer was that the animal was an object.
When things didn't work out, they simply returned it.  What the
advertisers intended was something else.  They wanted to show that
nothing in their home was more valuable than their precious coffee.
But did the viewer get the message?  Regardless of the *intent* of the
advertiser, it is clear that the edited version came after numerous
complaints of the original ending.  And rightly so.  Advertisers have a
responsibility to be respectful to issues that surround us daily.  Sure,
comedians use anything as material.  That is different.  It has long been
known that television has had a strong affect on how we live, how we
think, what we eat and our social obligations.  Ads depicting ferrets
as willing to attack someone when provoked or *teased* may have been
intended as humor, but the viewing audience is not always on the same
wavelength.
 
But just to turn this argument around for a moment... let's say the
ad actually does some good, as in, it weeds out those people who were
thinking of getting a ferret as a pet, but were not really ready for the
commitment.  Perhaps the ad helped a few ferrets from not being adopted
into a bad home.  In much the same way that Disney hurt Dalmatians, let's
think of how Verizon may have helped a few ferrets too and turned away
people that were not really serious about having one.  It may be an odd
way to think of it but I think most of us know that not everyone is
capable of living with a ferret.  Shelters on this list know all too
well how many ferrets are turned in simply because the owner was ignorant
to the special needs of ferrets and impulse bought on their cuteness.
Perhaps, in some small way, Verizon's ad actually did some good.
 
As with everything, there are many ways to look at a situation.  We owe
it to ourselves to try to look at as many possibilities as we can to
truly understand a situation.  Regardless of intent, we must focus on
what advertisers are really saying.  And without our input, they won't
know the difference.
 
Just some thoughts...
 
betty and her blur o'fur
for the love of ferrets
[Posted in FML issue 3880]