Noli Me Tangere

signs. everywhere signs.

I'm not sure what Mr. McLuhan would have said about this but lately I've seen funny signs. I pass so many advertisements every day that there are bound to be a few that are ridiculous. Like this one, which I pass twice each day:

Can someone explain to me how Star 94 is "different"? Different from what?

Dave Barry has written wisely about advertising, and though this was in reference to a different ad campaign, his words ring very true in this case:

"It may be the best marketing concept I have seen since back in the 1970s,when McDonald's, which does not wait on your table, does not cook your food to order, and does not clear your table, came up with the with the slogan 'We Do It All For You.'"

This is a truly bold claim, that a Jefferson Pilot-owned, top-40 radio station, which plays only "today's hit music" and whose only distinctive is middle-of the-road mass-marketability, is somehow "different". It's a little dubious when 99x trumpets the "alternative" label, but Star 94?? Give me a break. Has anybody heard Cindy and Ray? I've had sardines that were less canned than these two.

I would've said that Star 94 is "different" by virtue of being the ONLY radio station with no claim to the "alternative" appeal, but I guess that just went out the window.

Lately, posters for these guys have appeared all over campus. And it took me back. I saw Strike Force back in the 80s in the Macon Coliseum, and I remember thinking this was really a cool thing, these greased guys in tank tops who would grunt and smash things then talk about God. Somehow it escaped my notice that these were greased guys in tank tops grunting and talking about God.

I can't disparage them for what they do. It seems like an honest, legitimate ministry and it's hard to argue with results like "Averaging a 20% church growth within 12 months following crusade". But it makes me wonder how it came to be. Was there a pastor who woke up one day and said, "You know what this church needs? Sweaty men breaking bricks with their heads"? Or was it a bunch of ex-football players trying to find their part (pectoral) in the body of Christ? It doesn't even seem to be a secular knockoff, though they clearly come from the WWF school of evangelism.

If you want to hear a funny story, ask my friend Phil about the time the Power Team came to Romania to do a crusade. Apparently something was lost in the translation.