setting the record straight

Denver--Glad you got the book! You will have a fun few days or weeks (depending on how fast you read, and whether or not you blog as you go). One thing about Gonzo, you have to read it more than once, so be careful not to spill too much Chicken Lomain on the pages.

I had to weight in quickly and say that I didn't mean to imply that marketing=rape. Yikes-stripes, it's what I do for a living, and being gainfully employed (so far), I'd better speak up, just in case the boss checks in. :-)

What I did say, in some post way back when, referenced the rape of voice, which I think is a valid way of describing what happens to some of us when we sign those non-disclosures, non-competes, and all the other nons we sign to get a paycheck. Not every company is guilty of voice raping their employees, but I have worked for some companies that definitely deserve life for the crime.

In these cases, individuality and personality are stripped away from employees as a way for the corporation to control them. Everyone winds up thinking, acting, and sounding just the same. It's funny, but when you come out of one of those kind of companies, you really do feel like a trauma survivor. I can think of at least 7 people within my small circle at my own little-shop-of-horrors (last job) who've been in therapy since leaving the joint.

So while I think corporations can be guilty of violently and completely overtaking their employees to deflower them of any originality and creativity, I don't say the same for marketing, which, when done gonzo style, can be pretty darn pleasurable.