VIDEOThe lovers of branded life farm us all. They even reframe the origins of branding (as marking cattle) and don't mention that the word "Maverick" comes from a farmer who refused to brand his cattle. Am I a "maverick", I don't know, it does not matter for saying such things is a pointless rebellion. All rebellions end up as branded as we all are. We don't know how to engage a rebellion in freedom, we only know how to conduct rebellion through brand. We expect our branded swine existence not because the pigs are masters, but because we are the pigs.
Branding itself is not the problem, great branding is an opportunity, but a branded life is the pigpen we mentally create and through this perception we engage our existence. Branding of product and services is great. The Swine brand is a top notch restaurant created by 50 Eggs Inc. I definitely do not snort at this level of excellence, nor do I snort at the worlds largest brand creations created through creative agencies that employ some of the smartest minds on this planet. Yet when we are marketed and become the product, it is a normal reaction to be sliced into a personal brand and offer ourselves as a package to be consumed by the market.
I have a lot of good things to say about great branding because the sheer level of creativity injected into its creation is way beyond our everyday capability. Actually living in a pigpen is a physical reality that no one should endure, but the pigpen that is our mental reality, that one is not housed outside of us, that is the one we house in our inner being. Maybe the idea of the 1% is a reality that only 1% are able to free ourselves from the system, by becoming the farmers of that system. How many revolutions does humanity need that shed blood and tear flesh and destroy souls, to realize we eventually return to where we started?
As much as I celebrate top level creative agency work, I also celebrate top level logistics. How a supermarket comes into being and is stocked with supplies and food from every corner of the Earth is a daily miracle. That we require more sophisticated computers to keep up with a supply system that only a handful of people can conceptualize end to end, is marvelous. If our personal branding status is a euphemism for branded swine, then at least we can watch just how sophisticated the commercial world of pigs really is with these two following videos :
In our branded pigpen world very few of us possess the high capability mind to lead globally created systems of delivery or or the creative power of a powerful brand. Fighting iconic brand with activist brand is like fighting fire with fire. For sure we can snuff it out like that, but the fire will return, it always does. The pigs that burn are us, not the people that brand the pigs. This is why when we actually talk about humility, we are then looking at the truth of our place in the system. I may not be able to change one thing about our branded swine mentalities but at least we get to know our swinehood.
The most we can get out of facing the reality of personal brand is not a rebellion against it, but the laughter. We are, in the final analysis, as funny as pigs are. Our best efforts for rebellion and as rebels are but perpetual grunts. No sooner as we begin to talk as freedom is a domain, we choose a different logo, and what we choose is not freedom but new masters. The people that want power and take it from the people who have the power is what is played out at the highest levels of human capability. What if the reality of our noble cause is far ugly than we would like to admit? What happens if our claim to be continuous learning is simply fattening ourselves enough for a freedom that is made of control and power?
We are the pigs, I want to be humble enough to know that and thus I praise the cattle and the sheep who create our animal farm. Orwell maybe famous for his Orwellian tag made famous through his book 1984, but no matter what or who controls, or who has the power, we remain pigs and that is not an insult, it is our daily engagement of organizational comedy - as we get to laugh at ourselves and at the actual inner futility of personal brand, when we are the branded swine.
Comments
CityVP Manjit
6 years ago#3
That clip is certainly cute and as they say in England "simply delightful" 😊
CityVP Manjit
6 years ago#2
Yes Chris, collateral commercial damage 🐷 oink oink 🐷
CityVP Manjit
6 years ago#1
Yes Chris, collateral commercial damage 🐽 oink oink 🐽