Compassion and Kleenex®: Marketing to Our Higher Selves

Posted on February 27, 2009 by zoeweil

Waiting for my plane to board a couple weeks ago, I was watching CNN at the gate and was amazed to see that advertisers are now linking compassion with products. As a humane educator, I’m used to analyzing ads with students, asking the question, “What deep need or desire is the ad trying to fulfill?” Usually, students point out power, wealth, love, sex, beauty, esteem, etc. But on CNN, a Kleenex® ad that kept replaying was linking compassion towards others with facial tissue, and then mocking such behavior:

(Can’t play the video above? Watch it here.)

To meditative music we witness a western monk right an overturned baby turtle, place a beached goldfish back in a stream, and rescue a spider. Then he blows his nose into a Kleenex® tissue while the announcer says that Kleenex® kills 99% of bacteria. “That’s right. Kills.” The compassionate monk is startled. The commercial ends.

What are we to make of this? After just finishing Buy•ology by Martin Lindstrom, I’m newly aware that sex in advertising doesn’t really sell products the way we thought it did. Maybe compassion does; even when you then joke about it. I actually think this is a good sign. There are new books and new studies linking our happiness with kindness toward others (I write about this in my new book, Most Good, Least Harm), and while this Kleenex® ad may be snarky, it’s presumably based on the assumption that we humans want to be good; we want to be kind; we aspire to do more compassionate acts.

Whether this ad will make you buy Kleenex® brand facial tissues is another story, but I’m glad to see our highest selves targeted by ads instead of just our fear and greed.

Your thoughts?

~ Zoe

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Buy.ology: A Review

Posted on February 25, 2009 by zoeweil

I just finished reading Buy.ology: Truth and Lies about What we Buy by Martin Lindstrom. As a humane educator, one of the most important skills I hope to impart among my students is the ability to think critically and gain freedom from manipulation and brainwashing. Thus, books such as this are very useful to me and to the students in our M.Ed. and certificate programs in Humane Education and in our training workshops. Mr. Lindstrom discusses the new use of fMRI technology (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging) to understand our responses to advertising and branding — which is fascinating — and I found his chapter demonstrating the similarities in brain response to beloved brands and beloved religious icons especially so.

I had hoped for more on the ethics of branding and advertising, however, especially after reading the Foreward by Paco Underhill that describes Martin Lindstrom as exuding virtue. But there’s nothing virtuous about Lindstrom’s work or his book. He consults for multinational corporations, many of which engage in egregious human rights violations, environmental destruction, animal cruelty, and pervasive manipulation solely for profit. In one story in the book, Lindstrom describes an assignment he was hired for to “brand eggs.” I had hoped, finally, to hear Mr. Lindstrom speak truthfully about some negative aspects of an industry when he writes “I found myself standing inside one of the largest egg farms in the world.” Modern egg “farms” or more honestly, factories, cram hens into cages so small they are unable to even stretch their wings, let alone walk. The conditions in modern egg factories are so cruel and unnatural that it’s no surprise that he would be hired to improve sales of these unhealthy eggs by helping “this company create the perfect yellow” egg yolk. Lindstrom writes, “For ethical reasons, I couldn’t support the idea of adding artificial coloring to the grain, so instead, I identified a vitamin mixture that could be added to the hens’ feed that would produce yolks from light yellow to middling-yellow to the passionate yellow….” It amazed me that for ethical reasons, Mr. Lindstrom couldn’t support artificial coloring, but seemed to have no ethical concerns about the conditions for the chickens. Does Mr. Lindstrom know that the male hatchlings from the supply house were likely discarded (killed) by being dumped into the trash or ground alive, or that the hens would ultimately live for a year under brutal conditions before being killed without regard to even the most basic level of humane treatment?

Mr. Lindstrom says at the end of his book that he hopes he has helped the reader to escape “all the tricks and traps that companies use to seduce us to their products and get us to buy and take back our rational minds,” but this rings false. Martin Lindstrom has built his entire career on consulting with and serving these companies so that they will be ever more effective at persuading us to buy their products.

Nonetheless, I recommend this book because in it you’ll find valuable information for resisting branding and gaining a modicum of freedom from relentless advertising.

~ Zoe

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Changing Systems 4: Male/Female Ratios at Colleges a Call for Educational Quality and Respect for All

Posted on February 23, 2009 by zoeweil

On average, there are more women than men in college now. One statistic puts the ratio at 57/43 female to male with a trend that’s leading toward a 60/40 ratio. At my son’s high school, the highest grade point averages have belonged to girls for several years now. My son doesn’t find this surprising at all. It’s what he expects. He’s not sure why, but he thinks that in general girls work harder. He doesn’t think they’re inherently smarter.

Here’s what I think. I think that school systems (sitting at desks listening to teachers; having separate unconnected-to-each-other classes requiring multitasking and much to organize) generally (not always) work better for girls than boys, and that girls do better in the typical school structure. For years this system that may work better for girls than boys didn ’t offset entrenched sexism, which favored boys. Many studies have shown that boys are called on more frequently than girls and receive more attention, for example. But as institutionalized sexism has diminished, and as girls have gained the opportunities previously available only to boys, girls have been able to surpass boys academically and pursue higher education in greater numbers.

Should we be concerned that there are so many more girls than boys in college? After all, even though it’s great that girls are achieving so much, we still have a ways to go to reach full equality. Women still get paid less than men for the same work, and the ratio of women to men in leadership positions is far from equal. So maybe it’s a good thing that the ratio at colleges is 57/43 women to men. As a feminist this may be good news, but as the mother of a teenage son it’s really not.

I want our schools to equally serve our sons and daughters. I want a society where equal opportunity includes meeting the varying needs and learning styles of all our students, so that each can reach their potential and thrive. I want systems to favor both equality and respect for difference. As an educator, I know this can be done, but it requires a willingness to creatively confront and change outdated systems.

I believe that we should consider the skewed ratio of women to men in college a wake up call to assess and change our educational system so that it serves all our children better. And of course, we still need to confront the tightly coiled tentacles of sexism and unravel them so that our now majority women college graduates truly have the same opportunities as their male classmates.

~ Zoe

Filed under: education, systemic change | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Changing Systems 3: Giving is Easy When…

Posted on February 20, 2009 by zoeweil

After speaking at Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon, last week, I left with a few friends to head back to the co-housing community where I was staying. Moments after leaving the bookstore we passed a woman who was homeless and begging for change. I pulled out my wallet and gave her several dollars. My companions, all from Portland, stood nearby. I was aware that when one gives money and others don’t, people can feel awkward, and I let my friends know that if I lived in Portland, instead of rural Maine (where we rarely see people begging on the street), I would have walked right by this woman.

In fact, growing up in New York City, I routinely walked by people who were homeless, never making eye contact or trying to help. We moved to Maine from Philadelphia (another city in which I ignored those who are homeless) when my son was two, and he grew up without seeing people begging on the street. When I took him to Boston during his spring vacation when he was nine, and we passed a man in front of the subway begging for food, he turned to me in horror. “I can’t believe youdidn’t help him,” he said. I promised that this wouldn’t happen again. And it hasn’t. But that’s because it’s easy to give when you’re not confronted daily and visibly with the plight of so many in need.

Of course, people are in need all the time, and just because I don’t see people begging in Maine doesn’t mean that people aren’t in need both in my own state and across the globe. But staying aware and generous and working toward systems that prevent and solve poverty takes conscious commitment. It may have seemed to my companions in Portland that I was momentarily more generous than they, but in truth, our generosity needs to be directed toward long-lasting change, and none of us can maintain daily giving to those in need when we are confronted by so many so often.

Once again, we must work on solving underlying problems and changing systems so that no one is left in the situation of living on the streets, and no one is confronted by the daily call to give change, rather than build healthy, safe, and sustainable communities for all.

~ Zoe

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Changing Systems 2: Choosing My Father’s Ties

Posted on February 18, 2009 by zoeweil

When I was a child, my father would come into my room most mornings and ask me to choose which tie he should wear with the suit he had on that day. He usually brought two ties into my room from which I could choose. As I got older, sometimes I felt that neither choice was ideal, and I’d head over to his tie rack to suggest a better option. I adored my dad, and I took my job helping him with his ties quite seriously.

As a humane educator, my job now includes offering other people choices, although the choices revolve around more pressing issues than tie fashions. Offering positive choices is the 4th element of quality humane education, and it’s a critical component to creating a humane, sustainable and peaceful world. Humane education explores the greatest challenges of our time (e.g., global warming, resource depletion, human rights, institutionalized animal cruelty, habitat destruction, overpopulation, economic stability, etc.), and it offers positive choice-making as an integral component ofchangemaking . Like my father, I try to offer people a couple of choices that are reasonable and good, but sometimes no such choices are available, and my students must head to the “tie rack” of choices to find something better.

When there’s nothing quite good enough on the tie rack – no pattern or fabric that fits – system-changing and creativity are paramount. I never faced an insoluble tie choice with my father, but there were days I lingered for a long time, uncertain about the best choice. The best choice might have entailed designing a new tie.

We need to design new systems to solve many of our entrenched problems. The key is to recognize when a choice is good enough and when to engage fully in the process of designing aMOGO choice because none are suitable. In my new book, Most Good, Least Harm, I offer 7 keys to operationalizing the MOGO principle. Key 5 is “Model your Message and Work for Change.” In other words, wear the best tie you can while designing the best tie possible. We must all engage in system-changing — whether through our work, our volunteerism, or our charitable donations — in order to create the systems that make all our choices MOGO ones. And, at the same time, to the greatest extent possible we must model our message relying on what “ties” currently exist.

~ Zoe

Filed under: keys to MOGO, MOGO (Most Good), positive choices, systemic change | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Comments Off

The Stimulus Plan and Education: The Root of Positive Change

Posted on February 16, 2009 by zoeweil

Nicholas Kristof had an opinion piece in The New York Times yesterday that will likely make educators breathe a sigh of relief. When a columnist recognizes that education is the most important step in rebuilding our economy and creating a better future, we know that things are shifting. Education has always been too low on our list of national priorities, and the stimulus package, Kristof argues, thankfully, has put it in the forefront of change. This shift is huge. For decades I’ve been promoting humane education as the preventive work for a better future for all, and for decades we’ve continued to focus on putting out fires rather than on fixing problems at their root. Education is the root. With 100 billion dollars in the stimulus plan dedicated to schools, we now must ensure that the money is spent properly. As Kristof says, we need great teachers, paid what they’re worth, educating the next generation to be the enthusiastic, knowledgeable, and wise changemakers in every field and profession. When we see that columnists recognize this fundamental truth, we know we’ve made great strides toward achieving educational goals. Now’s the time to make sure that humane education infuses this vision, so that we are graduating not just literate people, but aware and committed people.

~ Zoe

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Changing Systems 1: Losing My Cool at the Airport

Posted on February 13, 2009 by zoeweil

I just returned from a 10-day book tour on the West Coast. The trip entailed 3 cities, 6 flights, one car rental, one train ride, and many speaking engagements in a variety of settings. I’m not the best traveler, easily stressing at flight delays and lost baggage, and because I need a bunch of props for my workshops, I try to make sure that I never check my luggage. It was challenging to fit 10 days worth of clothes and workshop materials into my carry-on bags, but I did it.

On my 3rd flight of the trip, very early in the morning, I walked up to security and there was a woman checking carry on bags to make sure they weren’t too big before letting passengers head into the security line. I’d never encountered such a person at the airport, and when she told me my bag was too big and had to be checked, I argued with her. I told her that I travel a lot and had never had a problem with this bag. When she insisted it was too big, I told her I was going through anyway. Whoops. Now I’d escalated the argument, and she insisted I fit my bag into the sizing unit. It was overstuffed, and Icouldn’t get it to fit in without emptying clothes from it into my smaller carry on. She kept harping on me that it wouldn ’t fit, was too big, and would have to be checked, and I was getting hotter and hotter under the collar. I eventually got it to fit, and turned to her, sarcastically saying, “Happy now?”

As I walked away in a major huff, sweating and heart-racing, I was astounded at myself. How unMOGO was that!? If my workshop participants could see me now, I thought. I sure hadn’t modeled the message I hope to convey through my life, my words, and my actions. Most of the time, I try really hard to make the working lives of people involved in air travel positive. I know from my own experience just how stressful air travel can be. Passengers are herded through security and told to be speedy, but we practically have to strip while remembering that our laptops, toiletries, shoes, jackets and sweaters, and empty water bottles, all have to be placed just so on the conveyor belt. We have to deal with lost bags, canceled flights, being kicked off flights due to overbooking or too much weight (even if we’ve paid full fare for our ticket). And all the personnel dealing with us stressed-out travelers have to endure our anger, anxiety, and frustration. I really, really try to be extra kind to them. Until someone pushes my buttons, and I overreact. Like I did in the San Francisco airport last week.

Why did I lose my cool so easily and so visibly? Although I tend to be someone who reacts quickly to things (negatively and positively), there was something else going on. It was this: the situation and the system. As I’ve written about in previous blog posts, we humans do not act solely according to our values; we are influenced by the situations we’re in and the systems we’re part of. This is revealed most profoundly by the Stanford Prison Experiment, and I had clear evidence for the power of situation and system that morning at the airport. I was in a situation in which I had little power and was at the mercy of a rule-enforcer who was uninterested in anything but exerting that power. I was in a system in which a small, but too high, percentage of bags are lost, and in which people are made to jump over unpleasant hurdles to reach a destination. (Less than a year ago, I endured a full body, no-parts-untouched, “pat down” in the Amsterdam airport.) A value I hold dear – treating people with kindness and respect – disappeared in this situation and system.

What is the moral of this story? Until and unless we change systems, we are unlikely to model the message we want to convey as well as we want to convey it. I’m not trying to excuse my poor behavior, but to remind us that we must work diligently at creatively changing systems so that they work in favor of good modeling and MOGO choicemaking . But next time, I will endeavor with much greater effort to not let the situation and system negatively influence my own behavior.

~ Zoe

Filed under: MOGO (Most Good), responsibility, systemic change, values | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Review of Most Good, Least Harm in Healthy Child Healthy World Blog

Posted on February 12, 2009 by zoeweil

Blogger Janelle S. of Healthy Child, Healthy World, a website devoted to helping create a healthy world for children, recently wrote a very positive review of IHE President Zoe Weil’s new book Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and Meaningful Life. Here’s an excerpt from the review:

“Weil is inspiring. Her book is never for a single second judgmental or demeaning. There were isolated moments of feeling overwhelmed, but Weil’s humane intuition clearly guided her as she wrote – the moment you find yourself overwhelmed, Weil’s words are there to calm you. Most Good, Least Harm is like sitting with a really wise, close friend. She’ll tell you her opinion. She’ll tell you what’s right. But, she’ll never make you feel bad for being you. She’ll bite her tongue just enough to let you find your own course. And then she’ll be right there to congratulate you in the end. It’s MOGO, through and through. And you can be MOGO, too.”

(Posted by Marsha Rakestraw, IHE’s Web Content/Community Manager)

Filed under: books, Zoe Weil appearances | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Zoe Weil Speaks About Humane Living at Powell’s in Portland, OR

Posted on February 11, 2009 by zoeweil
Zoe speaks to a standing-room only crowd at Powell's in Portland, OR

Zoe speaks to a standing-room only crowd at Powell's in Portland, OR

Last week IHE President Zoe Weil took a short tour of the West coast to give a couple of MOGO Workshops and to talk about her new book Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and Meaningful Life. On February 4, Zoe talked to an enthusiastic, standing-room only crowd at Powell’s in Portland, Oregon about the MOGO principle.

Zoe gave an interactive presentation focused on the 7 keys to MOGO living, which are:

  1. Live Your Epitaph
  2. Pursue Joy Through Service
  3. Make Connections and Self-Reflect
  4. Model Your Message and Work for Change
  5. Find and Create Community
  6. Take Responsibility
  7. Strive for Balance
Zoe talks with audience members after her presentation.

Zoe talks with audience members after her presentation.

For the key of “Make Connections and Self-Reflect” Zoe engaged the audience in analyzing the impact of products (such as a t-shirt) on ourselves, other people, animals and the planet. And at the end, Zoe invited the audience to reflect upon the skills and passions they have to help create a just, compassionate, sustainable world.

(Posted by Marsha Rakestraw, IHE’s Web Content/Community Manager)

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“Let’s Visit a Research Lab” – Another Example of Propaganda from the U.S Dept. of Health & Human Services

Posted on February 9, 2009 by zoeweil

In my last post on The Lucky Puppy coloring workbook produced by a U.S. government affiliate to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), I described the recent propaganda piece promoting animal experimentation directed at young children. I’ve been thinking about this disturbing behavior in the scientific establishment all day, and felt compelled to share another government, taxpayer-produced piece of pro-vivisection propaganda created for young children.

This time it’s a poster, titled “Let’s Visit a Research Laboratory.” Made for elementary school classrooms, and provided free of charge, the poster displays a lab like a doll house, with all the rooms open to the viewer, labeled, and with details about each room on the bottom. There are only two species of animals at this lab – monkeys and mice. The mice live in “rodent housing,” and each smiling mouse has a name on his or her cage (Lola, Eddie, Lana, Elf, Fuzzy, and Sam among others). The monkeys live together in spacious indoor/outdoor cages, play on tire swings and with brightly colored beach balls. In the “testing lab” one finds a smiling monkey happily playing on a computer. There’s one sad monkey, representing the only unhappy animal in the poster. This monkey is in the “treatment room,” and if you read the description you learn, “Most laboratories have a room just like a doctor’s office to care for animals if they become ill or get injured. Just like kids, monkeys can play rough and sometimes bite one another. They need treatment for cuts and scrapes.”

So what do little children learn from this free educational poster provided to their schools with our tax dollars? They learn:

  • That laboratories name their animal friends who enjoy their happy lab life, when in fact animals are numbered, called “subjects,” and are killed at the end of the experiments.
  • That “testing” is game playing, rather than being force fed drugs, cosmetics, household products and other chemicals.
  • That monkeys are spaciously housed together and provided with lots of toys and enrichment, when most are in small, isolated indoor cages, with little or nothing to play with.
  • That the only reason to “treat” an animal is because she or he has been hurt by other animals, rather than burned, shocked, cut open, or drugged by those who conduct research on them.

This particular poster is long out of print, but I still use it to train humane educators and as a critical thinking tool in schools. I had hoped that our tax dollars were no longer being spent on this absurd level of propaganda, but The Lucky Puppy, just published this past fall, proved me wrong. So, lest you think that The Lucky Puppy is an aberration, now you know that it follows a long trend of child-directed propaganda.

It’s crucial that humane education spread; that teachers bring critical thinking to students in age-appropriate ways; that we engage in citizenship to reject the cynical and manipulative use of our tax dollars; and that we commit to educating for a humane and sustainable world.

I consider these pro-vivisection propaganda publications as opportunities to engage in vigorous debate and even more rigorous humane education. I hope you do too.

~ Zoe

Filed under: accurate information, critical thinking, humane education, propaganda | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off

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