|
 Naturally - With A Pill Two weeks ago, I noticed
an advertisement for a pharmaceutical for the treatment
of erectile dysfunction. The ad, a full two-paged spread,
was in one of my wife’s magazines, a popular
magazine marketed almost entirely to women, primarily I teach introductory logic quite a bit. Since arguments are composed of sets of thoughts or claims, some of which are alleged to offer evidence for one of the other thoughts or claims, I spend some time with students discussing the importance of words. Words are our primary tools for the expression of our thoughts. To express clearly and unambiguously our thoughts, especially as they identify evidence from which we believe we are warranted to form inferences, it is important to use words with care in constructing and expressing our thoughts. Partly as a result of what I teach, I am inclined to find some expressions more puzzling than others might. Like the expression: "respond naturally once again--with the ease of a pill." I have become accustomed to not taking advertisements very seriously. Maybe there was a time when advertisements were meant to inform others about the virtues and benefits of a product, with the intent of convincing others that they should purchase it. I grew up in the era when a famous baseball pitcher was a centerpiece (or was it centerfold?) for advertising men’s underwear. How was that informative? The fit of underwear is a personal matter. Few of us have the trim build of the athlete, and that the underwear fits him is hardly a reason to think it would be comfortable on us. But the point, I am told, is not to inform us of the product’s virtues and benefits; it is meant to form a persuasive image: you too can at least imagine yourself as trim and handsome (and desirable) as the athlete if only you would purchase and wear the product. Once you understand this notion of image advertising, automobile, beer, cigarette, and soft drink advertisements make much more sense.
Just this thought has also lead me in another respect to take advertisements seriously. They inform us of the values and the mind set of our culture. In terms of values, the erectile dysfunction pill ad seems to me to suggest that the entitlement to an exciting and fulfilling sexual life is not only extended to our youth (in the minds of some people, even elementary aged youth), but also to everyone. The text of the advertisement is set against the background of a couple, perhaps in their early to mid 60s, dancing in what appears to be a ballroom. The closing line of the text is: "Let the dance begin" (and now I know why my Baptist Sunday school teachers frowned on dancing: it is a predecessor for "responding naturally"). Surely this is part of what is meant by the right to the pursuit of happiness. Only the overly prudish would deny the elderly this right. It was in terms of the mind set of our culture that I was most struck by the ad. For I was most puzzled about the sense of "naturally" that the company was using. In what respect was responding as a result of medication "natural?" I showed and discussed the advertisement with several of my colleagues. We pondered, as philosophers are inclined to do, what the advertisers might understand "artificial" to be: chicken wire and duct tape? To be sure, we got our share of laughs out of the ad. That is a pleasant consequence of my habit of viewing advertising critically. Still, I thought about how the mind set of our culture permits us to think of the results of chemical assistance as natural, and the consequences of cigarette smoking, alcohol and drug abuse, diabetes, high blood pressure, depression, stroke, surgery of the prostate or colon (these are among the officially listed risk factors for erectile dysfunction) as apparently unnatural. Was heart disease an unnatural consequence, for my grandfather, of years of smoking, eating fatty foods, and lack of exercise? Can we now imagine advertisements for a pharmaceutical that will result in aborting an unwanted baby "naturally?" The story continues. Last week while reading a hunting and fishing magazine marketed primarily to men, I saw an advertisement for the same pharmaceutical, with the same background of the couple dancing in a ballroom, but with slightly altered text. Here, the text claimed that this pill "may help you achieve erections the natural way--in response to sexual stimulation." No ambiguity here. None of this euphemistic language of "respond." Here it is precise: "erection." No confusion about what they meant by "natural." Here it is spelled out for us: "in response to sexual stimulation." I discussed this ad with one of my colleagues who teaches critical thinking courses. He suggested that the readers of the hunting and fishing magazine would have a clear sense of what is natural and what isn’t, and would probably balk like I did at the notion of "naturally...with the ease of a pill." So the marketing people had to have for the hunters and fishers a precise and unambiguous explication of what they meant by "naturally." Secondly, being a magazine for hunters and fishers, euphemistic language of "respond" would not do; you have to spell it out precisely to these people. I understand now: hunters and fishers, although astute about nature, are not attuned to euphemistic descriptions of reproductive behavior. There is more. Several pages after the ad in the hunting and fishing magazine, there appeared a full page advertisement by, coincidentally, the same pharmaceutical company that manufactures the erectile dysfunction pill. The company’s name was listed at the bottom of the page in the smallest print on the page (in the previous ad in the magazine, the company was not identified except where it was imprinted on a small depiction of the pill). Nowhere in this ad was the name of the pill mentioned, nor even that there is a pill that might alleviate the dysfunction. How more neutral could they be? The format of the ad was a FAQ, headlined as "Erectile Dysfunction: What Every Man Should Know." Erectile dysfunction looks to be an officially recognized ailment, complete with its own abbreviation. E.D., we are informed, is "widespread." There are "cases" of it, and these cases are not "just an inevitable result of getting older." They have "common risk factors" (some of which I listed above). I would not want to be an alarmist, but it sounds unnatural, like a serious disease with many environmental causal factors, analogous to cancers or heart diseases.
I could go on. But enough already. Some of what our culture values, and the mind set of our culture, is still in need of redemption "by the renewal of your minds" says St. Paul in Romans 12.2. In the instance I have examined, the central notion for renewal is that of the "natural." What physiological changes as a result of what causal factors are natural, and which are not? What is proper or natural functioning, against the background of which we can identify the dysfunctional? Is what is natural universal, universal over a species, or universal over a highly specified type within the species? These, to be sure, are very heady questions, but one’s we ought not shy away from in our conversations with others. We might be helped in thinking about "the natural" by reading Aristotle, Aquinas, and others. I cannot confidently offer much more satisfying advice, for I also read St. Paul in Romans 12.3: "do not think too highly of yourself, but form a sober estimate based on the measure of faith that God has dealt to each of you." As we read, and discuss our thoughts with others, we become not only better informed but more precise thinkers. On "the natural" as well as in many other cases, our thoughts really do make a difference. Eric Snider Last Updated 03/19/08 |
|
housekeepers. The text of the ad caused a reaction of
wonderment in me. The ad claimed that "you may be
able to respond naturally once again--with the ease of a
pill."
But not to worry; most cases of
E.D. are treatable by a variety of options,
"including oral medication, hand-held vacuum pumps,
self-administered injections, pellet suppositories, and
surgical implants." It looks like a mostly
unpleasant list of treatments, something like an 18th
century ad for treating gout: a variety of options are
available, including oral elixirs, leeches, burning,
bleeding, and amputation. Which one will you take? In any
case, it certainly helps me understand what previous ads
meant by "natural" as opposed to
"artificial." The ad asks one to seek diagnosis
and treatment from one’s doctor, and concludes by
informing the reader that "only your doctor can
prescribe the appropriate treatment." A not so
subtle inference one is to make is that appropriate
treatment requires a doctor’s prescription.
Naturally.