Brussels' overzealousness

Samuel Helbling on the impending EU ban on advertising slogansIf EU Commissioner David Byrne has his way, the advertising industry will soon face further trouble after the tobacco advertising ban. The Brussels Consumer and Health Commissioner wants to oblige producers of foodstuffs and luxury foods to only advertise with slogans whose claims stand up to scientific scrutiny in future. This could mean the end for numerous advertising slogans. Slogans such as "Red Bull gives you wings" can hardly stand up to a reality check. And the fact that "milk gives you strong bones" or that Hakle guarantees "absolute cleanliness" is unlikely to be empirically proven: Advertising language is more figurative poetry than sober analysis or even journalism committed to the facts. The slogan is a condensation of language that does not refer to reality, but rather conjures up a product. As a reflection of the advertiser on the mythical character of the product in our objectified world, the claim has a ritual meaning, it is an echo of the cultic objects of our ancestors.
Accordingly, the slogan precedes any rationalization of advertising through tests, surveys or market research. It is related to the Psalms, not to legal paragraphs. Advertising texts should use rhetoric to approach the aura of the product.
All sorts of owlish jokes are permitted: stick rhymes, corny jokes, word games, incomplete sentences, variations on well-known proverbs and sayings. It is gross nonsense to demand that advertising must be limited to product information. Nor would it occur to anyone to demand a scientific certificate for an ode to the Rhine Falls.
Brussels has not yet made its decision. But banning "popular poetry" from advertising would be tantamount to a declaration of the bankruptcy of civic maturity.
> Samuel Helbling, Editor-in-Chief