Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
It’s in your head:
Subliminal images get convention messages into viewers’ subconscious.
PHILADELPHIA — Democrats are messing with your mind at this convention. Republicans last week did too.
Democrats are making sure that their star speakers stand in front of soothing colors. They speak on a set that’s open and welcoming. Behind them are slogans that the party wants you to associate with Hillary Clinton.
It’s all part of subliminally delivering to millions of television viewers indelible images of Clinton and the Democratic Party. Political strategists have been employing such tactics since conventions became televised spectacles after World War II.
Republicans last week had the same goal as Democrats this week: They want to trigger impressions of their party and their candidates as serious, loving mothers, fathers, soldiers and statesmen and stateswomen. For GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, the silhouetted smoke-filled entrance Monday after his wife, Melania, spoke suggested the emergence of a strong leader and star.
“You’re combining aesthetics and psychology, and adding some spectacle,” said Tobe Berkovitz, an associate professor of advertising at Boston University and veteran political media consultant.
“Nothing is left to coincidence,” added Kenn Venit, a Connecticut-based media consultant. “Conventions are staged the same way as a Broadway show.”
Take a look at the 2016 Democratic National Convention logo. The zero is a Liberty Bell. Democrats, that says, are champions of freedom, heirs to the Founding Fathers’ legacy.
Democratic convention officials would not discuss specifics. “I can say that from the beginning we intended this to be the most inclusive, forward-looking and innovative convention in history,” said April Mellody, deputy convention chief executive officer for communications. With the stage design, she said, “we aimed to engage Americans well beyond the hall.”
Republicans had some success last week. A postconvention CNN/ORC poll showed Trump with a bounce, and he’s now slightly ahead of Clinton.
So this week it’s the Democrats’ turn to gently manipulate you into thinking good thoughts about them as the convention moves toward its closing arguments Thursday.
Here are some of their techniques:
Color them blue. Yellow is bright and happy. After Clinton won the nomination Tuesday night, longtime friend Terry McAuliffe, the governor of Virginia, spoke about her in glowing terms before a bright yellow backdrop.
But for most speakers, including first lady Michelle Obama, the backdrop was largely blue, which is cool and calming.
Repetition and inclusiveness. Monday, “Putting Families First” appeared behind speakers. Tuesday the flashed words included “Social Justice” and “Women and Families.”
The podium, too, is designed to be open and welcoming. It sits atop a long flight of wide steps, open to the floor — though no one unauthorized can climb them. At the top are two lines that converge in a circle, where most speakers deliver their remarks.
Everyone has that healthy look. “They bring in the best makeup artists. Everyone has to look healthy and vigorous,” Venit said.
The music matters, not so much the lyrics. What gets played creates mood and evokes emotion, said John Zody, Indiana Democratic Chairman.
Monday, when Sanders spoke, he was preceded by Paul Simon, singing “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.”
A day later, after Sanders asked the convention to suspend its rules and nominate Clinton by acclamation, Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” blasted through the hall. The delegates waved signs and danced.
What matters, said Zody, was not so much the songs themselves, but the memories evoked. Simon is a reminder to baby boomers of political battles of the past, the ones Clinton fought. “Happy” is a more modern signal.