On ads and arguments.

We are all sellers of one item or another. It could be a product, our own skill and talent, or an idea or philosophy close to our hearts at any given time. Whether a man offers trash or something worthwhile could, in many cases, be a subjective judgment on the part of the buyer. But the least that is expected of a decent man is that he will not supply garbage after advertising it as gold. Unfortunately, there is a big gulf between what men claim up front and what they actually end up delivering.

Most advertising is such that it attempts to give an impression of demonstrating the original claim, where in fact it demonstrates something quite different. To cite an example, if the claim of Manufacturer A is that its sponge absorbs water faster than sponges from other manufacturers do, then the demonstration better not be that it absorbs more water, which is 'proved' when the two sponges are squeezed to release water into their respective buckets. The adman hopes that his potential customers will fail to notice the difference between more and quicker; and indeed, a large majority does not disappoint him.

Of course, the adman does it deliberately, with impunity, and availing himself of every psychological trick up his sleeve. Whether it is the more familiar variety of advertiser that works for corporations or the thinly-disguised variant that is apt to introduce himself as media or campaign manager for a politician, the modus operandi is identical. False and misleading claims are right up there with fake reviews and testimonials when it comes to bread-and-butter tactics for advertisers.

Sadly, most of us are guilty of the exact same behaviour as the adman's, at least insofar as the results are concerned, even if in some cases it is done subconsciously, or (at any rate) not completely consciously. The only other difference is that while the adman is likely to be proud of himself for having exercised his marketing skills successfully, the ordinary man tends to hide from others and from himself anything but the most upright behaviour on his part.

Just observe a man courting a woman, or a woman trying to get a man to woo her, or both the woman's and the man's folks in the stages preceding an arranged marriage. Every one of them attempts to projects an image scarcely possible for a mortal to live up to in real life, and which could not be more distant from his or her true self. The result is extreme disappointment on all sides, often followed by acute...