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| Image credit: Mikael Colville-Andersen, Copenhagenize |
By maiming and poisoning, driving kills ... everything ... people, fauna, flora.
Yet this detrimental habit continues unchecked with political appetite for more roads, motorways and bypasses growing greedier by the day.
Published in the Sydney Morning Herald last week, Arwen Birch highlights the pervasive connection between promotion and human gullibility, and posits that just as we did with cigarette ads, so we have fallen for yet another product that detrimentally affects our health.
"A ban on car advertising may seem far-fetched, but if you compare the automotive and the tobacco industries, the similarities may be closer than you think. Smoking and car use have comparable health costs, yet while we have the strictest tobacco promotion laws in the world, we allow car companies to promote themselves unbridled."Would our politicians be open to banning car ads?
Right now, I doubt it!
As the Big Oil puppets that they are, in my opinion it would take a seismic jolt to wean New South Wales politicians off their auto-mobile pap and onto the solid act of minimising car advertising.
By way of illustration, cycling in Australia is seen as a direct threat to the automobile industry, and in NSW, State opposition to cycling is extreme.
New South Wales Police working with the community to reduce violence, crime and fear
With cycle paths ripped up and helmet fines increased by 349% over the last two years, cycling numbers in NSW have plummeted so when news filtered across political and media spheres that synchronised helmet optional rides were to happen across Australia and New Zealand last Saturday, the Sydney Oil patriachy set about nipping the Sydney ride in the bud.
Voila the excessive over-reach of the NSW Police Force witnessed when seven police vehicles were despatched to quash our implied right to political communication at our peaceful protest last Saturday in Centennial Park - the very strong arm of the law in action indeed, helping the community keep #BigOil centre stage of our lives ...
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| Freedom of policitcal communication via a peaceful protest |
... but we will not be silenced, and the law may find for us yet ...
... and with champions like this former governor of California, car ads will be a thing of the past in the not too distant future, of that I am sure.
That is extraordinary, considering that Arnie was a (moderate) Republican. Not that there was really any difference between the two major US parties in that respect.
ReplyDeleteIn the top photo, I note some cyclists wearing sun hats, a far more crucial safety item than a foam hat! And unlike the helmets, they aren't made from petroleum.