CELEBRATE BLACK HISTORY MONTH : DRINK HEINEKEN

OESTERHOUDT STRIKES

You might think that title is a joke. It isn't: I actually saw it printed on a New York City bus.

I thought I had seen everything in advertising. I thought I had cataloged every species of commercial dishonesty. But I should never underestimate commercial speakers: Their innovation knows no bounds. They push the limits every time. And in cases like this, they push straight into the surreal.

What the fuck does Dutch beer have to do with African-American identity and history? How does Heineken in any way relate to the black experience in the United States? How does Heineken reflect this country's poisonous racial legacy, or in any way symbolize it? I have no doubt that many African-Americans like Heineken beer. But would an average black man in America instinctively associate Heineken with black issues?

I can understand associating George Washington Carver, Crispus Attucks, Martin Luther King, Jr., Scott Joplin or even Snoop Dogg with Black History Month. All those men achieved prominence in American life through the decades. But Heineken? Where was Heineken during the Freedom Marches? Where was Heineken during the Civil War and Reconstruction? And where the hell was Heineken during the L.A. race riots?

Heineken is not African-American. It is not even a person. It is a beer. What role could it possibly have played in a Nation's development?

To suggest that blacks should celebrate their history in the United States by breaking open a Heineken is just asinine. After all, it was a Dutch merchant who brought the first African slaves to Virginia in 1619. That's not to say that Heineken reflects modern Dutch views about slavery. But the fact remains that the Dutch played a very dark role in the history of American slavery. In that light, it is especially perverse to suggest blacks should celebrate their history by drinking Dutch beer.

Heineken's ad is not just historically incongruous. It also shows just how little taste--or sense--most advertisers bring to their work. In this case, the advertisers did not ponder the embarrassingly weak connection between African-American history and Heineken beer. No, they merely identified a potential market (i.e., African-Americans), then matched their product to an important month in the "African-American calendar." Perhaps Heineken intended to forge a mental link between "African-American pride" and Heineken. Perhaps they wished to dupe African-Americans into believing that Heineken played a substantial role in their history. Maybe Dr. Dre likes Heineken. Maybe Duke Ellington drank it after his shows in the 1940s. Who knows?

Heineken simply concluded that African-Americans represent a "market:" Namely, a discrete body of potential buyers and sellers at a particular time and place. Any advertising that incites a market to spend money on the advertiser's product is worth the price. It does not matter if the message is crass, off-color, inappropriate, incorrect, counterfactual, counterintuitive, silly, ridiculous or just wrong. Those concerns pale next to the advertiser's mandate to generate profits.

In the end, advertising is not about consistency. It is not about respect, either. Rather, it is about implanting mental connections so that people spend money. In advertising, facts need not be accurate. Indeed, facts are not even necessary at all.

And taste? That's the least concern. If taste mattered, what self-respecting student of American history would dare to assert that Heineken beer has anything to do with the plight of African-Americans in this country? The thought is almost too embarrassing to entertain.

But that didn't stop Heineken from entertaining it. There is no shame--or dignity--in commerce.

That's another reason I'm not good at it. Damned ethics!

THE IT'S ALL ABOUT ME PARTY (AND SCREW EVERYBODY ELSE)

POLITICAL PARTIES FOR A CHANGING WORLD

By: Mr. E.G. O'Miner, President and Chief Spokesman; Chairman of the Board of Directors, O'Miner Property Acquisition & Development Co., Inc., a Delaware Corporation Specializing in Real Estate Hedges; Profilee, Fortune Magazine's Gold 100 (March 2007); Author, "It's Mine : Stop Apologizing for Your Money" N.Y. Times Bestseller for 24 consecutive weeks; Married subject to prenuptial contract.

No one ever got anywhere in this country helping others. Rather, our ancestors achieved success by focusing on themselves. There is no shame in being selfish when being selfish buys you a house. There is no shame in being selfish when you get the job and the bonus. Just think of it this way: If you stopped to help the other guy, you might not have gotten the job or the bonus. Where would you be then? I assure you, you wouldn't like it.

Yet somehow it has become fashionable in the United States to deprecate wealth. Even really rich people learn that it is rude to mention incomes, portfolios and real estate holdings in public. They even open themselves up to ridicule when they refuse to give money to charitable foundations. Put simply, successful Americans feel increasing pressure to express shame for their success, even though they have realized the American dream.

This is outrageous. We believe it is time to stop feeling guilty for our money and our success. As successful Americans with substantial property holdings and minimal financial worry, we refuse to be modest any longer. We refuse to flagellate ourselves for achieving precisely what everyone sets out to achieve in this country. Rather, we want the world to know what it takes to be successful. We want to step out and say: "It's All About Me." And we're going to be honest, too. We're also going to say from the top of our lungs: "Screw Everybody Else."

I started the It's All About Me Party (And Screw Everybody Else) because I got sick and tired of all the public recriminations about wealth. I started the party because I want to be honest about success. Look, you can't become a millionaire by giving money to others. Being a millionaire requires a decidedly self-centered mental outlook. You need to think about yourself if you want to possess money and property. You can't put together favorable business deals, meaningful commercial contacts or cash large checks unless you adopt a relatively egotistical approach to life. I say to you: It's OK. Don't give yourself "permission." Don't apologize. Rather, say: "It's all about me and I don't give a good two shits what anyone else thinks of me."

Let the moralists complain and call you selfish. You'll be the one laughing in a Bentley while they're talking to themselves in a used Honda.

Let me explain what I mean by "It's All About Me." Being selfish is a lifestyle. It is a commitment, too. When you say "It's All About Me," you take an oath to live for yourself and yourself alone. You tell everyone else to fuck off because if they're not making money for you, they're not worth being around. True, it takes courage to live for yourself; everyone from day one has told you that it's wrong to eat the whole cake without sharing. But you can do it. Be strong. If you really want to be a millionaire, you need to think unconventionally. Don't apologize. Don't share. Take it all for yourself. And be happy doing it.

When it's all about you, you use the word "mine" a lot. Don't be afraid to think about "my house," "my money," "my wife," "my beach home," "my portfolio," "my cars," "my coin collection" and "my inheritance." This stuff belongs to you. You worked hard for it. Why should you give it away? Stop punishing yourself for caring about "mine." Sure, your parents and teachers always scolded you for shouting "mine mine mine" when you refused to let some brat share your toys. But they didn't know what the hell they were talking about. Rebel against convention. Stop the guilt. Go ahead and scream "MINE MINE MINE MINE" without a shred of shame. After all, who's the one with the mansion?

You can do this. You can finally make yourself the center of your world. No matter how much you have been brainwashed to care about others, you must dare to see through the lies. If you crave success, you must penetrate the deception. Make yourself the star of the show. Put your needs first, not your paraplegic uncle's. Pleasure yourself, not your spouse. Keep your money in a high-yield account; forget about the charity fund. Screw your brother; he can make it on his own. The minute you start worrying about other people is the minute you veer off the path to success. When it's all about you, you enrich yourself and you even feel good about it. Don't be weak. Don't be conflicted. When it's all about you, there is no conflict: It's just you, my man.

We stand for freedom. We stand for liberty from guilt, self-doubt, pity and compassion. It's amazing what you can accomplish when you only think about yourself all the time. Although we also believe in telling people to "screw off," we do not think that it is a bad thing. After all, putting yourself first means screwing everyone else. It's all part of the ball game. The trick is shedding all those compassionate impulses you learned since birth. If you really want to make a name for yourself, you need the courage to tell everyone else: "Screw you and your problems; it's all about me."

Our opponents say that we live unvirtuous lives. They say we are cruel, unforgiving, heartless and superficial. They can call us all the bad names they want. We're the ones with the big jobs, the big houses and the big cars. We're the ones who get the hot chicks and go on the ritzy vacations. We feel no shame for serving ourselves, because selfish people make the world turn. We don't think "selfish" is a bad word because selfishness creates jobs for all the people who live to share. Put simply, when we say "It's All About Me," we drive the economy. So in a weird way, we share a lot more by refusing to share than we would if we lived to share. And not just that: Virtue doesn't buy villas or hire hot whores; selfishness does.

Be a man. Do yourself a favor and drop the guilt, will you? Join the It's All About Me Party (And Screw Everybody Else). Liberate yourself from bloodsuckers and annoying relatives. Make money without shame. Spend it on yourself, not greedy dependent children, beggars and wives. Because when you permit yourself to be a selfish, greedy, arrogant rapacious pig, you drive this Nation to prosperity. Plus you get a really nice house and a bulging stock portfolio. And that, my friend, is the surest chick magnet on earth.

So shut the fuck up with this "sharing" business. Because when you share, you cheat yourself. And there's no "share" in the phrase "It's All About Me."

Be different. Be selfish. Be strong. Be yourself.

SHAME OR GUILT : WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE?

AN ESSAY

I tried to answer this question during a conversation I had with one of my best friends. We often talk about philosophy and power, and we both agreed that "shame" and "guilt" are "kindred spirits." They are both strongly negative words. No one likes to feel guilty or shameful. They both imply that you have done "wrong." But are they really the same? That's the question.

Both "shame" and "guilt" flow from an acknowledgment of power. We only feel shameful or guilty when we recognize that we have failed to conform to a standard that we probably did not make. Someone else made the standard, someone we recognize as "superior" to us. In this sense, both guilt and shame emanate from below; the person who makes the rules that induce guilt or shame at most feels "disappointed" that his "subject" broke a rule. Shame and guilt, then, are for those who occupy an inferior power position. This is why Nietzsche called shame and guilt Sklavenmoral--Slaves' Morality. The rule-maker (or "master") does not feel them. Rather, he causes others to feel them because they do not adhere to his standards. They solidify his grasp over them.

But this does not mean that a single "superior person" causes others to feel guilt or shame. While a "superior person" may have originally laid down external standards, in most cases today external standards proceed from institutions. After all, power is deeply entrenched. It emanates from manifold places. It operates in virtually every conceivable manner, whether subtle or overt. Power radiates in families, in schools, in laws, in social settings and in professional relationships. It exists in commerce and in property. Most relationships involve a party with advantages and a party without them. That disparity provides an opportunity for dominance by one party over the other. And this is the setting in which guilt and shame flourish.

Guilt is more extrinsic that shame. Although both guilt and shame flow from an acknowledgment of power, the power that induces guilt is predominantly external. When we feel guilty, we feel bad because we know we have transgressed against some common rule or understanding. Our negative emotion springs from our awareness that we have violated an external expectation. This includes everything from the criminal law (an external authority about which we are conscious) to our parents (an external authority whose commands we respect). A person feels guilty when he steals or when he knowingly fails to attend a dinner he promised his parents he would attend. In both cases, the person knew he was obligated to do something by some external authority, yet he failed to adhere to the obligation. That conscious failure creates guilt.

With guilt, then, the inquiry is external. We feel guilty only when we acknowledge that some external authority holds power over us. When we break its rules, we feel guilt to the extent that we deviate from the "expected standard." Guilt requires an acquiescence to "superior" people or ideas. It necessarily makes the subject "inferior" to the standard he violates. And unlike shame, it can be objectively measured: The "superior" party can declare a subject "guilty" because the subject verifiably deviated from an external standard. This is why the law uses the term "guilt" rather than "shame." Guilt is a conclusion as well as an emotion. You just need to see whether a person met the standard.

Not so with shame. Although shame might feel similar to guilt, it flows from an entirely different conceptual source. Shame has internal origins. A person feels ashamed when he fails to meet a standard that he expects from himself, not a standard some external authority set for him. An external authority might encourage a person to expect certain behavior from himself. But in the final analysis, only an individual can decide whether to adhere to certain principles or beliefs. In this sense, shame intertwines with honor. An honorable person swears to himself that he will not act in a certain way to achieve certain results. He expects certain behavior from himself. He commits himself to certain principles and beliefs. When he fails to act in the way he expects, he feels shame, not guilt. He failed to meet his own standard, not an external one.

Consider a man who commits himself to respecting others and telling the truth. He makes these commitments because he personally believes that respect and truth are honorable principles. If one day he lies and disrespects a competitor to win a job, he deviates from his own standard. If he truly has honor, he would feel ashamed for breaking his own commitments to good principles. He might also be guilty of violating some external standard against perjury or untruthfulness, but that has nothing to do with his own internal transgression. And that internal violation creates shame. In short, shame is ethical (internal), while guilt is legal (external).

But shame still requires an "inferior" mental outlook. Although an honorable person decides for himself whether to believe in certain principles, in many cases he does not decide freely. The decision whether to believe certain things often depends on social circumstance and expectation. An external rulemaker has as great an interest in creating strong internal shame in his subjects as he does in crushing them under external guilt. A rulemaker wants his subjects to decide to believe in principles that could induce individual shame. All this inures to his benefit. For example, a person learns to believe that "it is good to respect private property." He also learns that it is "illegal to steal." If he steals something, he suffers both shame and guilt: On the one hand, he failed to meet his own internal standard about respecting private property; on the other, he knowingly violated the external command not to steal others' property.

Both emotions are negative. They flow from different sources. But in the end, they both serve to reinforce the "superior rulemaker's" control over his subjects. Guilty and shameful people are easier to manage than willful ones.

Shame seems purer than guilt. It is more individual than guilt because it depends on the individual's own moral ordering. But if a person's own moral ordering is not voluntary--and if individual moral ordering merely substitutes for external rulemaking--then the net effect of shame is no different than guilt: They both reinforce dominant values by inducing negative emotions in those bold enough to "transgress."