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The Wider Issues Underlying the Original Advertisement

The original advertisement. It can be found at https://www.pwrnewmedia.com/2008/cornrefiners082808/pages/magazineads.html

The original piece came from a selection of magazine advertisements made by DBB Communications Group for the Corn Refiner’s Association (CRA), a trade advocacy organization representing the interests of producers of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). It has been well-established that socioeconomically disenfranchised groups and people of color are disproportionally vulnerable to the health risks associated with HFCS consumption (Thompson et al., 2010). This is in part due to the cheap costs of HFCS-containing foods and the high-caloric nature of HFCS-containing foods which tend to displace nutritionally-rich foods in a person’s energy budget (Thompson et al., 2010). The overconsumption of HFCS thus lead to metabolic problems and contribute to the North American obesity epidemic. Interest groups such as the CRA has been funding scientific research and health policy think-tanks to direct the scrutiny away from HFCS as a culprit (Blackwell, 2015). One popular maneuver that such parties use is to call for more exercise to offset the caloric burden of HFCS-rich foods, which, while valid, ignores the profit-driven, systemic overconsumption of sugary products in western society.

The original advertisement is published by the CRA as a response to perceived concerns of HFCS, as it features a conversation wherein  an ostensible myth that HFCS contains more calories than sugar is cleverly dispelled. The faces of two regular individuals are shown in the ad, to give the impression as if this message comes from relatable everyday conversation rather than from the corporate ivory tower. In short, this advertisement intends to blunt the public’s negative perception of HFCS and the bottom text within the ad brands the CRA as an organization that is fair and open to dialogue. Of course, by its nature an advertisement is unilateral and does not facilitate any discussion with the advertiser themselves. On top of that, CRA is a for-profit interest group and it is unlikely that any discussion will change their standpoint on HFCS.

To those informed of the intrusive lobbying practices of the sugar industry, the advertisement is anything but genuine. Setting aside the self-righteous and condescending tone of the “clever” rebuttal, the underlying message of the advertisement is a strawman argument that tackles a non-existent issue. The primary concern of the public was never the equivalency between HFCS and table sugar, but rather the prevalence of HFCS in food products, the fetishization of sugar in media, and the role that interest groups such as the CRA play in skewing food science research and health-related policymaking.

My Jamming Methodology

The jammed version of the original advertisement

In my jammed version of the advertisement, my philosophy of subversion is to expose the bigger context of the issue and while unmasking the attitude of the publisher of the advertisement such that their snide and condescending tone is no longer hidden behind the veneer of wit. Within the original advertisement, the CRA attempts to pass itself as an organization that is open to dialogue when in reality it is a group that seeks to dissuade the public from having conversations on HFCS in the first place. To represent the CRA’s attitude, I pasted over new text boxes over the original quotations to effectively continue the non-conversation initiated by the advertisement. In my parodied dialogue, I am making it obvious that the legitimate concerns of the public are being obnoxiously drowned out by groups such as the CRA as they steer the topic away from HFCS whenever a discussion is being brought up.  I have also erased and pasted new words onto the bottom text-box of the advertisement while being minimally intrusive to the original text to emphasize the unsavoury tactics of interest groups in the food industry. Lastly, I have bloated the nape and cheeks of the male individual of the advertisement such that he appears to be morbidly obese, and I have distorted one of his eyelids such that it is comically drooping to represent the risk of stroke. When taken together with his preachy dialogue, these physical changes parallel the fact that health professionals and food science researchers who are supposed to educate and advocate for the public are ignoring their professional judgement by glossing over the harms associated with HFCS consumption. By extension, these professionals are ignoring the obesity epidemic itself, much like how the male individual in the advertisement is soapboxing to his peer while ignoring his own deplorable physical health.

References:

Blackwell, T. (2015). Canadian Researchers Have Received Hundreds of Thousands from Soft Drink Makers and the Sugar Industry. Retrieved June 3, 2020. nationalpost.com/health/canadian-researchers-have-received-hundreds-of-thousands-from-soft-drink-makers-and-the-sugar-industry.

Thompson, F. E., McNeel, T. S., Dowling, E. C., Midthune, D., Morrissette, M., & Zeruto, C. A. (2009). Interrelationships of added sugars intake, socioeconomic status, and race/ethnicity in adults in the United States: National Health Interview Survey, 2005. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 109(8), 1376–1383. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jada.2009.05.002

Corn Refiners Association: Magazine Ads. Retrieved June 3, 2020. www.pwrnewmedia.com/2008/cornrefiners082808/pages/magazineads.html.