Do attack ads ‘work’? Wrong question
Q: Lately, much has been written against bullying. Rightly so. But when political parties focus on the personality of opponents through attack ads rather than discussing issues, isn’t this just another form of bullying? And given that these ads are all over TV and seen by young people, don’t they validate this behaviour? A: The last hallelujah had barely faded from the Liberal coronation before the Conservatives fired the first salvo of their campaign to prove young Justin (good grief, he’s 41!) isn’t ready for prime time.
In some respects these weren’t attack ads at all. Given that Trudeau did say he’d consider making Quebec a separate country and that he thought Quebecers “are better than the rest of Canada,” it’s fair to serve up those quotes — even if they are from an earlier stage of life.
Trudeau is hardly the first politician held accountable for past indiscretions: Stephen Harper’s musings from his days with the National Citizens Coalition have, fairly, been used against him as well.
Other elements, however, cross the line. The circus music, the sneering shot about being “born with a famous name” and the footage of him taking off his shirt at a charity event (Oh. My. God.) all slip into the realm of character assassination. They don’t descend to the assault on Chrétien and his crook- ed grin — but they are tentative first steps down the same rocky road. What’s more distressing than the ads, however, is the tenor of discussion about them. Polls have been commissioned, academics with higher foreheads than mine interviewed, politicians questioned and cross-examined about what we all seem to agree is the central question: Do attack ads work? Am I the only one who thinks this the wrong question? In fact, not just wrong, but frankly, a wicked question. What does it mean to say these ads “work”? It doesn’t mean public discourse about issues is, in any sense, enhanced. It doesn’t mean voter turnout is increased, or respect for the political process deepened, or the country strengthened. No, to say attack ads work means that the “attacker” benefits, gets more power, earns more money, has more control, while the “attacked” is weakened, diminished, left powerless.
“Works,” in this sense, simply means “I win, you lose. I get to be the big man by making you look like a wimp.”
Lots of nasty things in our society work, in this sense, quite nicely. Yes, let’s start with bullying. It often works rather well, in the tawdry way we’ve defined: Creepy little twerps with crummy selfesteem feel important when they humiliate others.
Terrorism works, too, as we’ve been reminded again recently — a whole city was shut down, every major media outlet placed on monovision, by two losers who are now famous around the world. If that’s not a victory, what would one would look like?
Hockey violence apparently works, as do the antics of North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Syrian leader Bashar Assad — judging by YouTube, all three create throngs of adoring worshippers.
What sort of country, what kind of world do we become when we refuse to ask whether an action is right, just, decent, even (forgive me) kind — and instead settle for the sad, second-class question: “Do you think it will work?” Send your questions to star.ethics@yahoo.ca