By DONALD DeMARCO
The purpose of commercial advertising is to persuade consumers to purchase something that they do not need. This is not to say that advertising products are not useful, but to point out that they are inspired by sales and are not grounded in natural desires. By contrast, nature has equipped human beings with inclinations toward things that are not only good, but perfective. St. Thomas Aquinas established his notion of the natural law on the natural inclinations that human beings have that are personally fulfilling. Among these natural inclinations are life, love, the search for truth, and the desire to know God.
Advertising takes the place of natural inclinations (or natural appetites) but cannot offer what is truly fulfilling of the human person. Advertising is artificial; nature is natural.
At the same time, advertising often tries to create the impression that it offers the consumer something better than nature. Thus, the “natural look” comes out of a spray can, a certain brand of margarine infuriates Mother Nature, and an old cigarette commercial promises to transport its smokers to some beautiful mountain scenery where they are happily by surrounded cascading fresh water and clean air. Commercial advertising cannot replace nature, but it often tries very hard to imitate it.
A very successful advertising catchphrase is “This Bud’s for you,” the brainchild of Budweiser beer. Here, the play on the word “Bud,” hinting at an early sign of spring, offers the impression of nature. It also suggests a gift, which is misleading since the beer must be purchased. It also presents the romantic aura of friendship and love. The phrase has been set to music several times where it is readily available on the Internet.
Budweiser has invested heavily in the advertising market. The Bud Light brand, for example, has paid $1 billion for a six-year licensing agreement with the National Football League and pays $20 million annually for Major League Baseball rights. And this is just a portion of its advertising budget. Budweiser advertising has proven to be very successful not only in boosting sales but in establishing brand loyalty among its consumers.
Commercial advertising is a powerful force. We should be wary that it may cause us to lose sight of the importance of our natural inclinations. Advertising is seductive, ingenious, and omnipresent. Nature, though our constant companion, can be muted and ignored. Envy, avarice, lust, and pride are often commercial advertising’s allies. Thus, we are encouraged to be No. 1 and are promised satisfactions that are of a dubious quality. We become sitting ducks for the charms of commercial advertising that put our natural inclinations in a state of hibernation.
Nonetheless, if “Things go better with Coke,” we should not forget that things go better with love. If State Farm is our “Good Neighbor,” we should not forget the parable of the Good Samaritan. If Nike tells us “Just do it,” we should not lose sight of the difference between good and evil. If Disneyland boasts being “The happiest place on Earth,” let us not neglect the rich potentiality for happiness in a loving home.
Citizen Kane, regarded by some movie critics as the greatest motion picture ever made, has a cryptic ending. As Charles Foster Kane is about to expire, he mumbles his final word — “Rosebud.” A number of theories have emerged to shed light on this enigmatic word. The consensus indicates that after amassing great wealth that he did not and could not enjoy, Citizen Kane left the world longing for his youthful innocence, far from the world of meaningless acquisition. His sled bore the name “rosebud.”
Some critics believe that “rosebud” referred to the natural comfort and security he found at his mother’s breast. In this case, “rosebud” bears an ironic association with “This Bud’s for you.” The milk of human kindness is not beer. Charles Foster Kane had stacked his warehouse with rare and expensive items that bore no relationship whatsoever to his natural inclinations. He had cheated himself by allowing materialistic greed and pride of possession to obscure what he really needed in order to fulfill himself as a human being.
A reporter assigned to decipher Kane’s final word says, “Anyway, it wouldn’t have explained anything.” As the movie comes to a close, we see a close-up of the word “Rosebud” on the sled that has been tossed into the furnace, its paint curling in the flames.
The sled had been taken from him when he was a boy, when he was dragged away from his home to a boarding school. I venture to say that this one word does, in fact, summarize the life of Charles Foster Kane. It symbolized a man who had everything that money could buy and lost everything in the process that could have filled his heart. He was a prototype of John Paul Getty whose life was depicted in the 2017 movie All the Money in the World.
Citizen Kane and the latter motion picture are cautionary tales for anyone who is tempted to allow avarice and pride to smother his natural inclinations. The reason that wealth does not make a person happy, according to Sigmund Freud, is because it does not satisfy an infantile desire.
The natural law for St. Thomas Aquinas (ST I-II, 94, 1) inclines us to love our neighbor, marry and raise a family, seek truth, worship God, and live in society. Disregarding the natural law, upon which these inclinations are based, leads to alienation rather than love of one’s neighbor, cynicism and selfishness as opposed to marriage and the family, skepticism which stifles the search for truth, and secularism in contrast to the love of God.
To be in touch with the natural law is to be in touch with ourselves. Commercial advertising has its place, but its role is not to subvert nature. Indeed, nature remains our most reliable possession.
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(Dr. Donald DeMarco is professor emeritus of St. Jerome’s University and an adjunct professor at Holy Apostles College. He is a regular columnist for St. Austin Review. His latest two books, How to Navigate Through Life and Apostles of the Culture of Life, are posted on amazon.com.)
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