Well, isn’t that nice? Emerson is making little imaginary plants sprout all over a fake piece of coal in CGI (it looks like a coal Chia Pet): that’ll solve all the world’s problems, I hear! Okay, so this is silly, because while it’s a visual metaphor, it’s also completely fake, and we all know it. This ad talks about how Emerson is helping China use less coal power plants? From what I understand, China is building coal-fired power plants at an alarming rate, and I haven’t heard a damn thing about Emerson helping them do otherwise anywhere else except for this commercial, so for all I know, this could all be a big lie. What are they using instead? Can they tell us? Or should we just trust the big faceless international corporation’s advertising campaign and believe them without any specifics? I don’t know how dumb they think we are, but maybe they’re right. All I know is, the next time I want to get imaginary plants to sprout on a fake piece of coal, Emerson will be the first company I call to make it happen! (So long as they promise not to reveal any specifics about how they do it in their advertising, which must all remain completely nebulous, non-specific claptrap!) Or, maybe I’ll just buy a Chia Pet, and spread that Chia stuff on the coal myself. (That’s probably a lot cheaper! And it might even work.)
But you know, coal is just carbonized plants anyway, so maybe they’re just showing it as what it used to be, so we’ll think of it as “green”, rather than as the black smoke it produces when we burn it. And that’s just good reverse-psychological propaganda!
Here’s the coal Chia Pet commercial:
