Advertising...Why Can't It Be a Force for Good?

While enjoying my morning tea, I was catching up on some Olympic coverage of the amazing Serena Williams, and thoroughly relishing the fact that I had nothing pressing to do for the next couple of hours.  And, then, a commercial from Arbys flashed on the screen.  It features a young man enjoying the newest Arby's promotion, Snap and Rock.  Evidently one snaps a picture, texts Arby's, and wins, according to the ad, every time.  As the young man was reveling in his rewards, he was proceeding to walk down a street destroying mirrors and other property set outside an antique store.  For his reward, he was narrowly missed by a piano falling from an upper window.  

Even my modern advertising standards, this commercial is bad.  It appears to endorse wanton destruction of someone else's property and ends in the fable that somehow one can escape misfortune by snapping pictures of Arbys food.  Ridiculous and irresponsible.  So, I promptly got on the web, located the "contact us" button for Arbys and fired off an email.  If more people would take the time to register indignation, corporate America would pay more attention.  They get away with this kind of outrageous message because we let them.  Let's wake up!  Corporate America is only as good as the Americans who watch the ads and buy the products.