FWIW about product use age by spokespeople, I met Deacon Jones after he did the light beer ad. The beer company delivered something like 10 cases a month to his house.
There’s a lot of side issues here, but I’m going to focus on what I originally said: I find your “blame the victim” attitude disturbing - not because it’s unique to you, but because it’s so common. When did we evolve to the position that it’s okay for marketing to lie to us nonstop, because if we believe anything they say it’s our fault for doing so?
It’s easy to throw out sweeping cynicism and say that ‘everybody knows’ ads are all lies etc., but it’s far too simplistic to say that anyone who believes any part of what an ad or marketing campaign says, especially in controlled industries like medicine, dentistry, law etc., is a buffoon who shoulda known better.
If I run a body shop and picture a factory-painted Lambo with a $40k paint job by a master craftsman in Modena… gosh, are you a sucker for believing I can do a job that good on your Chevy?
I think there’s quite a difference between the usual unattached figure - the babe draped over the car hood, the hunk holding the whatever - and something as specific as a dentist’s ad for tooth whitening using an impossibly pearly smile he likely did not create. Saying the OP or any of us are jest stoopid for believing otherwise is being a tool of the marketers, giving them a universal pass to psychologically, socially and economically abuse us any way they like “cuz only stupid people are affected.”
Only if you want to know which piece of crap is the least crappy. Consumer advocates, even the best of them (=CR) do not consider it their job to question anything but relative product quality and “economic validity” of consumer transactions. That is, they are not allowed by their own rules to say, “Y’know what? Don’t buy any of this shit.”
And what’s really interesting… they won’t talk about it.
Here’s something similar. I remember reading about how people selling exercise equipment will get their “before” and “after” picture models. The “before” will be someone in terrible shape; the “after” will be the person in great shape.
Well, what they do to find models is find someone who used to be in great shape but then stopped working out (possibly because they, like, broke a leg or something). That’s the before picture. Then, they get that person to get back to their usual routine and they’re in great shape again. That’s the after picture.
So, on the one hand, it is the same person and they did change from out-of-shape to in-shape, possibly even using the advertised equipment. But it’s only because the model was someone who typically is in great shape and has the mentality and motivation to get back in shape. For a normal out of shape person (who might lack the motivation and exercise routines that the model had), the results wouldn’t be the same.
I’m not sure what you’re referring to, but Consumer Reports says in almost every issue not to buy certain products because they don’t meet their standards or are flat out fraudulent.
I think he’s talking about entire classes of product.
It could be. Or it could also just be atypical results from hyper-dedicated folks. My cousin did one of those “Body for Life” workouts and I took the “before” picture. Three months later, I saw his “after” picture (I was living abroad, so I didn’t see him at the time in person). I was absolutely floored by how much weight he lost and muscle definition he gained. It was exactly like the “before/after” pictures you see in those ads. I saw him a few months later, and, in person, yes, he looked trim and built, but the guy threw himself into the workout 110%. Of course, about a year or so later, he lost his drive to continue and gained the weight back (although he’s settled into a middle ground now.) But the results after three months were there, and they were real.
^I should say workout and diet, the latter being a very important component. Now could you get those results with just an Abmaster? Of course not.
So you haven’t actually read any of the Consumer Reports magazines. There are no such rules and they talk about it all the time.
I almost always assume that the people in any advertisement are paid actors or models.
I would only accuse a dentist of false advertising if he/she
- Showed before and after photos, which would strongly imply that the person displayed was an actual patient who got his/her white teeth from this dentist.
or
- Couldn’t really whiten teeth to the degree shown in the ad.
One would at least hope they are action shots of the lawyers actually, I don’t know, citing case law or compiling briefs.
I’m almost positive that shots of lawyers in compelling briefs are illegal in most states.
I have worked in advertising for a number of years…i think the idea is that the dentist probably does have patients with teeth looking that good, and he could perform cosmetic procedures to get the same effect.
Who the teeth belong to is pretty irrelevant.