MILK IS EVIL

Milk, a simple thing, loved by cookie eating children all over the world. It is a great source of vitamins and used to produce all matter of delicious and waist expanding foods.  However, do not be fooled when you stumble to your fridge late at night to enjoy your fix of “white goodness” – there is a dark story behind milk that you might find very disturbing…

The innocent action of drinking a glass of milk is something that most of us would take for granted, but the truth is that behind all the creamy, smiling moustaches hides a terrible truth. Think for a minute about where your glass of milk comes from. “A cow”, you might say. Well no, your milk probably comes from a supermarket and where was it before then? Perhaps a distribution centre. And before then? Maybe a bottling plant. And before that? Yes, maybe a cow on a farm…

Now think of all the CO2 emissions involved in getting that milk from the cow to your fridge. No doubt it was driven from the farm, by truck, to the bottling plant, and then again to the distribution centre and then driven again to the supermarket. And the milk didn’t just jump into your fridge, you probably drove to the supermarket and back to buy it. Add to this the C02 emissions caused by your fridge which is on 24/7 and the plastic bottle the milk comes in and you can begin to see the problem. But that’s not the worst of it, the biggest C02 emitters in the world, bigger than car emissions, are actually cattle herds.

This is the chaos and stupidity that hides behind the simple action of drinking milk. Our economy has become so complicated and geared towards linear profit that drinking a glass of milk is actually causing excessive wastage and climate change. Of course it’s not the cattle’s fault nor the milk’s fault , it is the fault of the milk drinkers – human society.

So what can we do about this? Here are some suggestions:

• Go directly to a dairy farmer to buy your milk and use a refillable pail.

• Keep a cow in your yard and get up early to milk it every morning.

• Stop drinking milk and dairy products.

• Drink as much milk as you can before the earth turns into one big desert.

• Set up a diary farm terra-transformation project on Mars, it’s fucked anyway and can only get better with a bit of grass and some cows.

In all seriousness, this is just the milk supply chain, I could move onto cereal and other staples, but it would probably leave you terrified of your fridge and eating organic mung beans that you bought from an old hippy woman called Sunshine.

DARK & JOYOUS

Once there was a boy with a head full of ideas.

He lived in a dingy, grey world that was full of fears.

To free his head of what was deep inside

He jumped off a wall and cracked open his mind.

And as his blood spilled over the floor

the boring world was coloured with joy.

THE EARTH CONQUERS

When I wander through the cool, marble halls of a mosque or marvel at the gilded vaults of a Christian church, I cannot help thinking that the sky is still blue outside, the sun still shines upon the same roofs. One day, when the Earth chooses to claim back its own – when marble blocks are jumbled, when gold is buried deep – what will all this lofty ambition amount to?

The Earth, no matter where you stand, is the same. All men ultimately walk the same path, no matter what they build in their minds or with their hands.  Ancient religion with all its idiosyncrasies, faults and beliefs leaves nothing  but broken monuments and quaint beliefs for future generations to study and wonder at.

If one looks at the pyramids of Egypt, the Acropolis of Athens or the Aztec monuments of Mexico, you can see how time mocks firm belief; how the Earth ultimately conquers all. What is the enchantment and mystery of man-made monuments when we are surrounded by the incredible temple of the sky, the majesty of the Earth beneath our feet?

PAY WITH ACORNS AND YOU WILL GET… ACORNS

It is said that from the smallest seed can grow the greatest tree. As a “creative” I fully embrace this logic – ideas needs to be fed, cared for and nourished to grow into something truly magnificent. However it seems that the South African advertising industry doesn’t think it is necessary to irrigate, prune, fertilize and care for their creative talent – creatives are merely young trees ready for the logging.

Okay enough metaphor, what is really pissing me off here is the ridiculous state of creative salaries in South Africa. I have recently been nosing around the job market and it was with great amusement that I turned down a job for a mid-weight copywriter position in Cape Town with – wait for it – a salary of R10 000 without benefits. Let’s be clear here, I am qualified to the hilt with a BSocSci in marketing and psychology, a diploma in brand management from the AAA as well as another course in copywriting from Vega. I have worked in the industry for seven years with experience in marketing research, brand strategy as well as four years of copywriting experience with a number of well-known international brands.

To illustrate my point further, in the US, a JUNIOR copywriter earns between 25 000 and 35 000 US dollars a year, which is over R185 000! Mmm, the word brain drain comes to mind…

So here is my challenge to the big bad South African ad agencies out there: if you are wondering why there is “just no talent” in the ad industry today, put down your axes and pick up your watering cans (and your cheque books). The current state of affairs is just not good enough!

PS. Potential employers out there thinking that there are hundreds of copywriters out there who will take lower pay… Well you can look forward to a full-scale writers strike like the one held in America in 2007/2008. Just watch this space

ZUMACATE ME PLEASE!

It was with great pride that I voted in the 2009 elections and I will let you know that I voted DA, but there is something that confuses and disturbs me… I was under the illusion that a president should at least be educated to the level of the average voter. Even if this is not the case in South Africa, I find it ridiculous that our current president doesn’t have a matric education.

One might say that it is easy for a “white” male with all the privileges of a tertiary education to criticize… However, I am not going to apologize for being white and let me share just what my privileged education has taught me:

If we take into account the “inequalities of the past” the Apartheid government didn’t allocate adequate funds to rural schools. Everyone knows this, and it is obvious that South Africa is suffering from a lack of skills, today, caused by the Apartheid years of yesterday. However, a basic matric was available to those that really wanted it and there were many people who conquered the inequalities of Apartheid and went on to become doctors, lawyers, accountants and… yes, even politicians. The question that burns in my mind is, “Why didn’t Jacob Zuma get a high school education?”

There could be may reasons for this, so let’s forget about it for the moment and focus on the future of our country. It seems obvious to me that education is the most important challenge facing South Africa today and I think the fact that the majority of South Africans even voted in a man without a matric is an excellent indicator of just how bad the situation is. So one would hope that education features highly on the government’s budget. The sad fact is that it doesn’t.

Here is where South Africa faces its ultimate double-edged sword – only a man without a basic education would approve an education budget like this:

“R24.8 billion for health AND education”

VS

“R787 billion to create jobs through infrastructure development for municipalities, provinces and parastatals”

Forgive me for being “educated” but surely you can create all the jobs in the world but without educated people to fill them what’s the point? Here is where Jacob Zuma shows his true intelligence…

Let me explain what is really happening here: R787 billion equals government tenders and contracts awarded to ANC fat cats who will mismanage and pocket as much of this budget as they can while education has to share a piddling R24.8 billion WITH health services.

A suggestion President Zuma, perhaps you should go back to school because some people actually read your budgets and just because you put “creates jobs” in a sentence doesn’t mean that a R787 billion budget, that should be equally shared with education, will go unnoticed.

Am I the only person that finds this completely shameful? Please can someone Zumacate me? OR if you would like to vote me in for president please contact me. I am, by the effects of Apartheid or not, more educated than the current incumbent and it seems that these days anyone can run a country, so why can’t I?

IDOLS OF COMMERCE

Fake idols of commerce and communication, driven by a few of my whispering words: BUY ME, I will make your life better, I will make everything alright. A bunch of lies bound in cheesy alliterations and puns: buy your life back and send this world deeper into its dying days. When the plastic piles up and the resources run out what will these words mean anymore? Just a sad script for an American dream long dead – a misguided voice without conscience. Yip, turn up your contrast, type away at your digital life, it`s easier than dealing with what`s really going on.

Screen your eyes from reality and click through to another existence because the current one is boring. From computer screen to cellphone screen to TV screen – SCREEN your life away because actually living is obviously too painful. Click to the next track, play, pause, rewind, forward, reply and copy them all in. The thing is, no amount of clicking is going to send you closer to happiness or away from that sick sense of false security.

Unplug, Log Off, Shut Down, cancel your credit cards and get the fuck out of town. Breathe the fresh air.

SHAMANS ON DEVELOPMENT

Midnight, November 23rd, 2009, Huacabamba, Peru.Yachak, the shaman, wakes me up. He is adorned in a feathered headdress. He leads me through the dark to his voodoo, shaman room. There are stuffed animals everywhere; weird plants are hanging from the ceiling and a large table is littered with crucifixes, human skulls, llama foetuses, blood and feathers. Yachak pulls out (what I can only describe as) his ¨He Man, Castle Greyskull¨ type sword and stabs it deep into the dirt outside – apparently this is the signal for the ceremony to begin.

Next, a bucket of San Pedro is brought in. Half an hour later and the floor starts to melt away. The full moon becomes disturbingly close and the shaman beckons me towards an ancient flight of stairs leading up into the clouds – I try to follow him but he is too quick and he dissappears.

Twelve hours later, 3ºC glacial water wakes me up. I have been through hours of chanting, dancing, jumping, skull throwing, moon worshipping and sword waving. Once I get out of the freezing water – spluttering, naked and confused – my shaman has a satisfied look on his face. Clearly he thinks that the ceremony has been enough to remove any bad spirits from the ¨gringo¨ world.

The sad thing is that while he sits there in his jungle retreat in Northern Peru, sipping on San Pedro and contemplating the Universe, I sit at my computer: just one of a million feeding the global system that eats away at Yachak`s piece of jungle paradise.

A last desperate communication from an elder race to a younger one – stop advancing and take a look at the world around you.