Shooting the Ad

Some people might have thought the big news this week has been about an electoral upset in the world's most powerful country. For others it could have been a tragic accident on public transport in Croydon.

But judged by what most people seem to be talking about, obviously the real big news was the unveiling of the new John Lewis commercial on TV. Each year this presents us with the professional standard against which the rest of the industry gets measured. The aim is always to disguise the vulgarity of grasping consumerism by encasing it in a more refined fantasy world trying to keep the sentimentality just within bounds but never absent. This year's has tried harder to avoid the worst excesses of mawkishness by going for humour and wildlife: animals are a sure hit. And it's undoubtedly clever and amusing. So marginally less cringeworthy. And we could say, if pushed, that there's something of a message that we should see our wildlife as an essential part of our lives and should be prepared to share with it.



Interesting that the Wildlife Trusts are getting something out of this, though I don't know how that works. It confirms what we had already worked out - that Wildlife Trusts, as a major strategy, is much more concerned with relationships with major corporate interests and piggybacking on big names than getting along with local people or responding to our concerns. Charity as big business.

A comment reported from the Countryside Alliance suggests that the wildlife shooters have been a bit sour about the adverts, implying that it's part of an urban myth about cuddly foxes etc. and the reality would be a lot of wild defecation on the trampoline. But then anything that tells us wildlife have any role apart from target practice for the gun-lovers will be sneered at from that quarter.

As for the Wildlife Trusts, I've always optimistically hoped that they're not all as gruesome as SRWT. If I'm wrong in this and they are all as bad as one another then it might be worth wondering if the trampoline should be covered in cowpats.