In the last two centuries, you could measure society by its literature and poetry. Romanticism (1800-1850), for example, was a reaction to the Industrial Revolution \u2013 which in itself was a jarring experience that turned time and action in to a commodity and gave birth to bleak landscapes. In the following century, World War 1 gave rise to great literary works in which characters were scarred by war.<\/p>\n
In another hundred years, they won\u2019t need to read the books of our time to understand us. They\u2019ll just need to look at our advertising campaigns.<\/p>\n
Advertising, and marketing, have become the new mirrors through which we reflect society, our values, our frustrations and our yearnings. And though Taco Bell\u2019s \u201cRoutine Republic\u201d campaign highlighting a pair of #breakfastdefectors is really just about fast food, you\u2019d be terribly wrong to think we\u2019re just talking about food.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re talking about much more. We\u2019re talking about the point at which three generations meet, discovering what they have in common. From Baby Boomers, to Generation X and newcomer Millennials, the one thing they all have in common is a desperate need to be free.<\/p>\n
Though we\u2019re not facing the bleak landscape of an Industrial Revolution, and nor are we facing a war at the horrific magnitude of World War I, we are facing something very real and psychologically jarring in a devastating new way: inauthenticity and regulation. Without getting into a long-winded discourse about how we\u2019re more trapped than ever before in any time in history, we can agree that there is an increased amount of regulation and surveillance on our individuality than ever before. It\u2019s despotic and Taco Bell gets that.<\/p>\n
And audiences are raving over that connection.<\/p>\n
The last three to four generations has seen has seen a significant push back highlighting dystopian societies. A move that officially spun out of the perfectly packaged lifestyles of the fifties, it\u2019s an idea of dystopia that takes several forms. We saw it in 1948, when George Orwell published 1984, an ominous tale of a world to come that we see in Taco Bell\u2019s \u201cRoutine Republic,\u201d marked by the emphasis on \u2018double speak\u2019 in phrases like \u201csame is happy,\u201d and so forth. In the early 60\u2019s and through the 70\u2019s, we saw a faux-utopia \u2013 a place where everything seemed perfect but was not. Fauxtopia was captured in movies such as Soylent Green<\/i>, Logan\u2019s Run<\/i>, and in TV shows like The Prisoner<\/i>.<\/p>\n
More recently, we\u2019ve seen versions of dystopia in films like V for Vendetta<\/i>, Hunger Games<\/i>, Divergent<\/i>, and so forth. We\u2019re even seeing in it envelope-pushing mini-series like Black Mirror\u2019s<\/i> episode titled \u201c15 Million Merits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Taco Bell understood this. It connected it\u2019s brand, and that of rival McDonald\u2019s with something we identify. We hear the Orwellian double-speak; we recognize V for Vendetta\u2019s<\/i> all-seeing \u2018chancellor\u2019 and the post-apocalyptic poverty found in Hunger Games<\/i>. And finally, there\u2019s the epic escape of the symbolic Adam and Eve as seen in Logan\u2019s Run<\/i> (later poorly remade as The Island<\/i>). These are cultural anchors we recognize, including of course the brilliant chosen track by the Ramones, which had its own double meaning: a Blitzkrieg on routine.<\/p>\n
For anyone still confused about why revolution and defection is really important, consider where else we\u2019re seeing these strong currents.<\/p>\n
The theme of revolution continues with TV shows like TURN<\/i> and Sons of Liberty<\/i>, as well as in other films like Snow Piercer<\/i>, Branded<\/i>, Minority Report<\/i>, Matrix<\/i>, Equilibrium<\/i>, and so on.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re seeing it in literature, most famously with just about anything Neil Gaiman has written in the last decade, but even with Harry Potter<\/i> and His Dark Materials<\/i>.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re seeing it in the work place with thought leaders like Seth Godin and Malcolm Gladwell and a greater shift toward the free agent economy that allows people to be people first and workers second.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s everywhere. It\u2019s in the fabric of who we are today as a people.<\/p>\n
We are people who want to break free from routine, who want to reimagine a reality without control, and act as change agents with the freedom to determine our course \u2013 even if that means simply choosing a better breakfast menu.<\/p>\n
Taco Bell gets this. They told a story \u2013 and a brilliant one at that. They shared a message we can all relate to or want to relate to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the last two centuries, you could measure society by its literature and poetry. Romanticism (1800-1850), for example, was a reaction to the Industrial Revolution \u2013 which in itself was a jarring experience that turned time and action in to a commodity and gave birth to bleak landscapes. In the following century, World War 1…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":309,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2171],"tags":[109,1737,1738,1935],"class_list":["post-4281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-beyond","tag-marketing","tag-bell","tag-taco","tag-dystopian"],"yoast_head":"\n