Posted on 09/11/2005 6:46:54 PM PDT by Jack Black
I have been watching NFL football today, one of my few TV viewing vices. The games were great, especially the Lions finally winning an opener in a convincing fashion. However throughout the games, on those channels as well as several others I watched are these totally vulgar ads.
For those of you who have not seen them the theme is that 'cable TV sucks'. The visuals involve various things being sucked onto the TV screen, shoes, one old mans clothes except for his underwear, etc.
Most parents I know have worked diligently to help our kids understand what words and phrases are not popular. Certainly in our house 'sucks' has always been a bad word. After all most of us know that 'sucks' is short for a description of a common sex act.
So this is where we are at. One of the largest TV providers thinks it's cleaver to use gutter slang for sex acts as the tag line for their saturation bombing ad campaign.
Well, I'm not sure about you, but I think I'll stick with my cable, thanks very much. Dish Network, no thanks.
Unfortunately, I do know what channels they're on. Fortunately, I have a remote so I can turn them off. And I do.
"If you don't like a company's ad campaign tell the company to change it."
Unfortunately, it takes a million people like you and me to make a difference.
Fortunately, you and I have been known to do just that.
Anyone who would think teaching children obedience is severe is clueless in my mind. My daughter goes to public school, but other than the proper use of the words "blow" and "suck" (noses, drinking, wind) is dealt with immediately because courtesy is a high priority - not forced courtesy, but just because that is the way people should interact with others.
My comment regarding being offended actually was directed to the many FReepers who claim that because something is offensive to them they should not be subjected to it, up to and including laws being passed to keep them from being offended by something, even if it means walking all over the private property rights of others.
There is an OFF button on the TV, there is a website or telephone to use to register your complaint. I find people complaining about what they are watching on TV no different than people complaining about bars or restaurants that permit smoking - if you don't like it - don't go there. CHOICE, PERSONAL RESPOSIBILITY - 2 very simple facts.
I'm only one person - I pick my battles very carefully because my time, and energy is limited. This ad campaign is not something I'm going to even give a second thought.
If Microsoft made vacuums, that'd be their only product that didn't suck [old joke].
From the end credits to an episode of Tiny Toon Adventures ("Tiny Toon Music Television", which featured a number of songs including Shirley Ellis' "The Name Game"):
Pretty subtle. Though I suppose you could always render it "Flucky".
---This happens all the time - I can remember a prim and proper English teacher talking in class about someone "shooting their whole wad" - like she didn't have a clue what that expression meant, and I don't think she did.---
Er, you're the one without the clue in this case.
"shooting your wad" goes all the way back to the black powder days, when it mean loading up your gunpowder, and your 'wadding' (used to hold the gunpowder and ball in place, and provide a tighter seal so the blast doesn't just go around the ball or waste energy), and shooting it without putting in the ball. There's nothing dirty about it.
Later it was co-opted to meant someone shot their wad of cash.
Only the ill-informed or the dirty minded consider 'shooting your wad' to mean anything lurid.
I find myself less offended by particular vulgar words than by the attitudes that characters on television and in advertising often display even while using words that would, in and of themselves, be considered entirely innocuous.
Thank you!!!!!!!!
I knew there was another definition other than the gambling one I cited. I just couldin't remember it and my husband was doinng something and I didn't ask him.
Again, my thanks.
No problem!
I don't know whether it's more funny or more frustrating that people insist that 'shoot your wad' is some kind of dirty reference. But I try to clear up the confusion whenever I can.
I have a hard time understanding anyone having problems with perfectly normal expressions and assigning sexual conotations to them.
My personal opinion is that those are the people that are causing the problems. The "cable sucks" ad campaign by dish network is NOT offensive except to people who seek to find sexual or immoral connotations in everything in life.
It has been an interesting topic all the way around - I now must bow out and wish you (and all) a fond good night - the alarm clock will be goig off in about 4 hours :)
IS that because it really sucks or because it does not?
This bears repeating, imo.
I do not watch the things I did before a couple of our grandkids came to roost here. Li'l pictures have big ears and all that.
More often than not it is not the program, but the commercials which are over the top for four and five year-olds. It would be nice if the smutty stuff were at least saved for later at night, after the kids are in bed.
Has anyone said it yet??
The Clinton Legacy lives on!
Nope! Let's hope it ends there, and not at "First Husband".
Interesting..
my father was considering switching to Dish and didn't because they couldn't give him the networks. Must be a regional thing.
I was more offended when I had to explain to my 70+ year old parents what Mayor Nagin meant by "Getting a fix for their Jones".
Nonsense. The phrase is used in Tom Sawyer. It's American slang that dates back to at least 1850.
As usual, the objection combines prudery, dirty-midedness, and ignorance.
No, it's rude.
How exactly do you disagree with the post?
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