Bugger the Billboards

Auckland City’s attempt to control advertising signs and billboards around the city deserves a cheer. There aren’t too many bouquet’s for the move in the media, with the political right working itself into a self-righteous slather in defence of the right of the advertising industry to invade our public space, and the Herald running one of its small-minded campaigns in defence of those noble nation builders of the outdoor advertising industry.

The Councillors who have proposed the by-law changes have primarily justified the move on the basis of improving visual amenity in the city. Quaint Edwardian facades clearly lose something of their gentle charm with Dan Carter’s crotch competing for attention next door. While there is definitely some merit to this argument, my main reason for supporting the by-law has more to do with the right of citizens to go about their business in public space, without the constant and aggressive mental intrusion of advertising.

The purpose of advertising (as distinct from store signage that identifies where a shop is and promotes it generally) is to influence your mental processes and convince you to buy something, that presumably you would otherwise not. We are driven (in part) by this advertising to believe that consuming more and more will make us happier, when in fact the evidence continues to mount that mindless commodity fetishism is a self-perpetuating cycle by which we become disappointed by the failure of new products to truly satisfy us, yet convinced that the only solution is to buy more (think – “140 000 troops won’t do it, I’ll try 20 000 more").

I object thoroughly to the advertising industry’s role in this cycle, and am increasingly sickened by the quasi-scientific approach taken by professional marketers to scientifically target messages to certain people in an attempt to create a pavlovian impulse to buy.

Sickened as I am, I can live with it in spaces that we have some control over. We can chose to change the channel when the ads come on (or not turn the TV on at all), we can decide not to buy 250 page glossy magazines that devote 165 pages to advertising, pop up settings can be changed on our browsers, and spam filters installed.

However, when the advertising industry moves into our public spaces such as streetscapes as billboards and signage increasingly have (and semi-public spaces like buses), we lose that control. Every person has an equal right to be in these spaces, and in my view to be there without being mentally pestered at every turn. I have no doubt that the constant pressure to buy created by the advertising industry at every juncture of the day is a contributor to feelings of stress, anxiety, and inadequacy in our society.

Why should we tolerate this in our public spaces? Pestering people to buy more crap is not a fundamental human right.

Brian Rudman also very helpfully points out that the by-law is unlikely to actually affect the business of genuine local traders.

My hope is that the hearings process will result in a by-law that remains firm on the key tenets of the proposal, while allowing some sensible compromise and refinement on the rules governing store signage. You can join me in submitting here.