Truth well told

I'm watching the third season of Mad Men. For those who don't know, it is a TV series about a hot-shot advertising creative director in an agency on Madison Avenue in the early sixties.

The guy is Don Draper. And his life is perfect. Looks like a million bucks, always dapper, has a mind that's razor sharp, acclaimed and respected for his work, women swooning all over him, the perfect family in the perfect suburban house. In short, his life is picture perfect. But he's a troubled guy. So troubled in fact, that he has several affairs, is always acerbic to the point of being terrorising, and has a general disdain for humanity wherever he goes. He has an empty life and he tries to fill it up with emptier trappings of success and intellectual affairs.

The real reason for this is that his life is a complete lie. In fact, even his identity is assumed. So he's a walking example of a falsely propped up reality.

I am sure the makers of the serial thought him up as a metaphor for advertising itself. David Ogilvy defined it as 'Truth well told'. But the basic premise of advertising is that while telling the truth well, you have to lie by omission or commission. Everything must be picture-perfect beautiful, but at the core of it all, there is an ugly falsehood or the ugly truth, depending on the way you choose to look at it.

The sixties were the height of the American dominance in the world market. As Draper says, 'The average American today has a lifestyle, which only kings in most of the world can dream of'. On the back of this prosperity, the advertising industry was booming. Brands were taking birth, being built and becoming legendary. And advertising was respected and held in awe for creating brands - for its ability to create something out of almost nothing.

In a lot of ways, the India of today is the same. Our confidence and optimism gives us a feeling of being absolutely invincible. Consumerism is at an all time high and only growing. Reports are rife about how India's middle-class is earning more and spending more. The numbers of the poor are declining and we are all headed to a Utopian world at breakneck speed.

It's a pity that advertising has degenerated to being a supplier industry rather than a knowledge industry. But nevertheless, it does play a vital role in the scheme of things.

I also am from the same industry. I too believe in brands - not just as a part of my work, but also as a buyer of them. I believe that showcasing a brand helps me project who I am. I have completely bought into this propped up reality that I help create and also partake in.

Life is really good.


PS: Incidentally, Mad Men has one of the most amazing title sequences I've ever seen. The only one that I don't fast-forward for every episode. Here it is: