INFO!

One of my favorite commercials, created by neuromarketers (modern psychology in advertising)

 who understand that cute dogs doing funny stuff will get our attention.  They give us, "dog tested
 and approved," as the closing line to help us think favorably about the brand name.

Why would a car maker use dogs in their ads?  Because everybody says, "Awwww," and watches the whole thing.

Commercials and infomercials -- those really long product shows -- are not information,  just attempts to influence where our money gets spent.  They are not objective or the solution to needs we might have.

Advertising by definition is strong persuasion, an attempt to talk us into buying something we wouldn't otherwise consider, to provoke a sense of need in us that their product will satisfy better than some other.

We need to regularly remind ourselves what it is about and explain it to our kids, commercials are not information.  They're after our money, our lifestyle, our priorities, and our self-image.  True?

One of the world's smallest countries, Sao Tome & Principe
-- poor, but a gracious culture.  They think differently than 
we do.  Their world is a bit more real than ours, perhaps.

Need a little clarity?  Leave the country for awhile, discover who you are in a world full of people like you and not.  See what it's like to live on $5 a day with one TV channel and no internet, to walk instead of drive, and do all your shopping at the street vendors instead of a store or online.  Such a reality check will help, but it's hard to really understand and adjust, of course.

Most important, make sure your kids understand.  The media is sponsored, the reality they present isn't real or reasonable, and letting such things taint your thinking (your life) is about the same as deliberately living in a sty, even if all the pigs love it.