A New Era Of Advertising – Ben Garrison Cartoon

Big corporations have HR departments that set policy for employee hiring, training, and education as well as indoctrination into corporate ‘culture.’ Yes, each company has a stated culture, which are all pretty much the same.

The HR departments tend to be populated by social justice activists and politically correct types. Their job is to make sure employees fall in line. This is achieved by fear. Companies will not tolerate racist, sexist, or otherwise intolerant behavior. Anyone caught telling an off-color joke by the water cooler could be fired. A male employee who compliments a female employee on her appearance could find himself in big trouble.

To prevent such trouble, the HR departments train employees on proper etiquette, behavior, and other matters that’s really nothing more than common sense. Employees get lectured about the company’s desire for a healthy, productive work environment with a welcoming atmosphere. The two words most favored by corporate HR departments are ‘diversity,’ and ‘inclusion.’ These words are used with a fervent religiosity. People ‘of color,’ ‘the LGBQT community, the disabled and so forth are to be treated with exceptional tolerance and kindness.

White males? Not so much, because they are usually seen as potential transgressors of company policy.

It’s all so much theater. Adult workers for the most part do not need to be drilled in common courtesy and how to treat others. It comes from within and pressuring people to learn stuff they’ve known since their school days seems silly.

Companies delight in such mandates, though. They know their employees will work hard for their pay because well-paying jobs are hard to come by. So they ratchet up the culture, which becomes even more intrusive. They often also increase the workload and hours. Some companies even tell employees how to ‘play.’ Yes, they insist their workers have smiles on their faces and songs in their hearts while slaving away. To the myriad vice presidents and MBAs running the show, it increases what they call work ‘engagement. Employees with cynical, odd, or grouchy personalities–even if they do their jobs well–are seen by management as heretics. They receive bad reviews and are hounded out. Facebook has a cult-like company culture that forbids conservatives.

Regardless, it almost always boils down to power and money, which usually leads to corruption. Employers have power over their employees who work for money and those leaders just can’t resist the power of tinkering with their employees’ minds.

Apparently ,that’s not enough anymore. Now global companies want to influence the behavior of their customers. Gillette came out with a commercial hectoring men for being too aggressive.

We need to tone down our toxic masculinity, we’re told. NIKE hired Colin Kapernick and subjected potential customers to lectures on race, political correctness, and virtue signaling. PayPal kicked off people who didn’t align well to their own political correctness. Patreon did the same thing.

This is not a good trend. We aren’t their employees—we’re customers and we have a choice. We need to stop patronizing companies who patronize and scold us with their unctuous, politically correct advertising.

—Ben Garrison