Sainsburys xmas ad

[CB Fry]

Once you again you managed to ignore the point in order to take a cheap shot.

 

Here's some "cheap shots", ignoring the "point" of an advertisement from Sainsbury's.

 

I get that message because it is all very clean and tidy. No blood, no guts. no piles of sh*t. Nice young men shaking hands and being nice to each other and having a nice game of football. And then one gets a bar of chocolate. Nice. All given to you by those nice people at Sainsburys. I say it is a "lie" because all advertising is about bending the truth. Lets take the multi million pound campaigns for cigarettes for example. Smoking made you look cool - nothing about killing you. If you use Lynx deodorant you have dozens of beautiful women throw themselves at you. Use our product and your life will be better. Shop at Sainsburys because our advertising agency have seen a way to take the interest in the WW1 centenary this year and make an ad for Christmas out of it.

 

Of course people understand that it was a brief respite and I am not suggesting otherwise but there is an awful lot more going on here. A small event is being taken out of context and used to try and persuade us to buy our Christmas goodies from a particular supermarket chain.

 

Laughable.

 

How you managed to compare it to cigarette ads took mind-bending skills of disingenuousness, but well done all the same.

 

It makes it okay because it says forget all of the horrors of the Great War, we can feel safe in our nice warm homes because human beings are basically good and in the right circumstances will do something humane and kind (with a bit of help from Sainsburys)under certain conditions. In fact those two soldiers were trying to kill each other the day before and continued to do so the day after. As I said earlier, many soldiers were shot when they climbed out of the trenches and tried to fraternise with the "enemy" but we didn't see that because the situation had been sanitised for our Christmas consumption. It is selling a lie by compressing a nightmare that lasted 4 years into something decent that lasted a few hours..

 

Laughable.

 

Clue: that 2 minute advert was not trying to "compress the nightmare that lasted 4 years into something decent that lasted a few hours". Just a cheap shot of spectacular misunderstanding from you.

 

Your shots are Aldi-cheap. Keep taking them.

[CB Fry]

Is this your only "skill"?

 

Arf!

 

It's not a skill. Too easy for that. A bit like mocking gullible saps fawning over internet conspiracies.

[pap]

It's not a skill. Too easy for that. A bit like mocking gullible saps fawning over internet conspiracies.

 

Unskilled then.

[CB Fry]

Unskilled then.

Indeed. Any idiot can do it.

[sadoldgit]

Here's some "cheap shots", ignoring the "point" of an advertisement from Sainsbury's.

 

 

 

Laughable.

 

How you managed to compare it to cigarette ads took mind-bending skills of disingenuousness, but well done all the same.

 

 

 

Laughable.

 

Clue: that 2 minute advert was not trying to "compress the nightmare that lasted 4 years into something decent that lasted a few hours". Just a cheap shot of spectacular misunderstanding from you.

 

Your shots are Aldi-cheap. Keep taking them.

 

You really are a deeply unpleasant person.

[pap]

Indeed. Any idiot can do it.

 

And boy do some idiots get involved.

 

It's been lovely, as always.

 

Enjoy the diminishing returns. I certainly do in your case.

[Smirking_Saint]

**** me Im glad the footballs back this weekend

[pap]

**** me Im glad the footballs back this weekend

 

I've a lot of admiration for what CB Fry does and it is a constant source of personal shame that I've never put the hours in to my own "being a complete c**t" project.

 

People try to make excuses for me. They tell me that I do other things, and that I shouldn't feel bad about not being a complete c**t. I'm thinking of giving up making the amusing football images so I've got the time to kick homeless people.

 

Something's got to give.

[sadoldgit]

It is not the first time that C B Fry has infected a thread and ruined it. I wonder if he has dashed off a patronising letter of mock outrage to the authors of the articles reproduced earlier from The Guardian and The Independent who also had the temerity to say that they also found the ad to be in poor taste?

[CB Fry]

It is not the first time that C B Fry has infected a thread and ruined it. I wonder if he has dashed off a patronising letter of mock outrage to the authors of the articles reproduced earlier from The Guardian and The Independent who also had the temerity to say that they also found the ad to be in poor taste?

I'm not outraged by anything here, mock or otherwise.

 

You're about to post up the letters you've written to Sainsbury's, AMV BBDO and The Royal British Legion, I take it. Looking forward to reading them.

[Smirking_Saint]

I've a lot of admiration for what CB Fry does and it is a constant source of personal shame that I've never put the hours in to my own "being a complete c**t" project.

 

People try to make excuses for me. They tell me that I do other things, and that I shouldn't feel bad about not being a complete c**t. I'm thinking of giving up making the amusing football images so I've got the time to kick homeless people.

 

Something's got to give.

 

What you really need to do is create a Xmas good natured add that uses something completely detestable as a metaphor.

 

Plenty to work with still..

[Verbal]

It is not the first time that C B Fry has infected a thread and ruined it. I wonder if he has dashed off a patronising letter of mock outrage to the authors of the articles reproduced earlier from The Guardian and The Independent who also had the temerity to say that they also found the ad to be in poor taste?

 

He may be a little abrupt for your taste but he's also right on this. Your objections are painful to read, because you don't see that you're rather preciously imposing your own view of the experience of trench warfare (when you actually have none) which is every bit as partial as the one represented in the ad. If you go and listen to the extensive archive of sound and vision recordings of first-hand testimony lodged at the Imperial War Museum, you'll hear a much richer view from those who actually fought and survived. It includes testimony about incidents like the one in the ad, and others, such as the long periods of incredible boredom, even when the enemy were a stone's throw away. And then there are the bursts the indescribable horror - the kind of horror which even a news broadcast today (or then) cannot show. Notably the truly hellish accounts of the effects of gas warfare, and the effects of shelling.

 

So instead of imagining the war and imposing your imagination on the ad (and remember, any sensible viewer knows that ads are not and do not claim to be contributors to the historical canon), go and have a listen to these records. As someone who's contributed recordings to the museum (interviews conducted with survivors of the Burma railway), I can tell you that if you take the time to listen, you'll learn a lot...

 

Wars are horrible, but they are not reducible to the horror.

[sadoldgit]

Then why get your knickers in such a twist? Is it just so you can feel better about yourself? No I haven't written any letters to any of the above. All I have done is express and opinion on an internet forum about a Christmas ad and have contributed to the online debate. Have I lost sleep over the ad? No. Do I want it banned? No. Do I think it is distasteful? Yes.

 

I supposed you will also sneer at the cinema full of people who sat through the ad when it was launched only to say as one "FFS" when the Sainsbury logo appeared at the end? A lot of us have clearly got it wrong but it is good to know that there is always someone trolling away waiting to redress the balance.

[pap]

What you really need to do is create a Xmas good natured add that uses something completely detestable as a metaphor.

 

Plenty to work with still..

 

Got it. In that case, I'm casting CB Fry (or a palatable body double if suspicions are founded and the real thing is too hideous) as the main protagonist. He will receive a gift in festive surroundings he's trying to snarl out of existence. A small tear will roll from his angry eyes.

 

Soft music, the faint refrain of bells in the background.

 

The message "Even c**ts deserve Christmas" appears on the screen. Fin.

[CB Fry]

Then why get your knickers in such a twist? Is it just so you can feel better about yourself? No I haven't written any letters to any of the above. All I have done is express and opinion on an internet forum about a Christmas ad and have contributed to the online debate. Have I lost sleep over the ad? No. Do I want it banned? No. Do I think it is distasteful? Yes.

 

I supposed you will also sneer at the cinema full of people who sat through the ad when it was launched only to say as one "FFS" when the Sainsbury logo appeared at the end? A lot of us have clearly got it wrong but it is good to know that there is always someone trolling away waiting to redress the balance.

 

Err - you know it's you getting upset about this ad, right?

 

My knickers are in no twist, I'd love to see you quote anything from this thread that shows different.

 

As Verbal has just pointed out above, you seem to do an awful of "projecting" of your own thoughts into others and then getting upset.

 

If I'd seen it first in the cinema I would have groaned as well. It's mawkish beyond belief and a poor use of ad spend in my opinion - I've already said that on this thread. Pay attention.

[sadoldgit]

He may be a little abrupt for your taste but he's also right on this. Your objections are painful to read, because you don't see that you're rather preciously imposing your own view of the experience of trench warfare (when you actually have none) which is every bit as partial as the one represented in the ad. If you go and listen to the extensive archive of sound and vision recordings of first-hand testimony lodged at the Imperial War Museum, you'll hear a much richer view from those who actually fought and survived. It includes testimony about incidents like the one in the ad, and others, such as the long periods of incredible boredom, even when the enemy were a stone's throw away. And then there are the bursts the indescribable horror - the kind of horror which even a news broadcast today (or then) cannot show. Notably the truly hellish accounts of the effects of gas warfare, and the effects of shelling.

 

So instead of imagining the war and imposing your imagination on the ad (and remember, any sensible viewer knows that ads are not and do not claim to be contributors to the historical canon), go and have a listen to these records. As someone who's contributed recordings to the museum (interviews conducted with survivors of the Burma railway), I can tell you that if you take the time to listen, you'll learn a lot...

 

Wars are horrible, but they are not reducible to the horror.

 

Isnt that the point though? It is my own view (and I am not the only one by the way). No, thank God I don't have any experience of trench warfare, but I used to live near the Imperial War Museum as a kid and spent a lot of time there. I also did Modern History at A level and read many books about WW1 and its horrors. That is why I feel it shouldn't be used to sell Christmas groceries, but again, that is just my opinion. It may be "laughable" to some people but it is a view shared by many.

[sadoldgit]

Err - you know it's you getting upset about this ad, right?

 

My knickers are in no twist, I'd love to see you quote anything from this thread that shows different.

 

As Verbal has just pointed out above, you seem to do an awful of "projecting" of your own thoughts into others and then getting upset.

 

If I'd seen it first in the cinema I would have groaned as well. It's mawkish beyond belief and a poor use of ad spend in my opinion - I've already said that on this thread. Pay attention.

 

I am not getting upset. I am just fed up with the way you conduct yourself on here. But then that is what you do, you try and wind people up. But you win, this is the second thread I am bailing out of because of you and your patronising comments.

[buctootim]

The whole point is that its not about the war, its about the pause in the war because of Christmas spirit.

 

If they were firing bullets into each others skulls yelling "Happy Christmas Fritz / Tommy" whilst the voice over said "Don't go abroad this year, enjoy your Christmas with Sainsbury" you'd be right, but they don't.

[sadoldgit]

Hey, remember when Christmas used to last 12 days? Now it’s so bloated it’s virtually an epoch, lasting twice as long as the year it falls in. The early-warning signs keep changing: not so long ago the start of the holiday season was signified by the release of the Christmas edition of the Radio Times. Now it’s the annual unveiling of the John Lewis ad, which this year features a boy arranging for a trafficked overseas bird to be smuggled into the country inside a small container and presented like a gift-wrapped object to the laddish penguin mate who exists only in his troubled mind. They say psychopathic murderers often start their “careers” by doing ghastly things to animals: hopefully they’ll keep the storyline going year after year, as his illusory brain-penguin commands him to carry out increasingly hideous yuletide ceremonies, until eventually the advert consists of nothing but him appeasing the Penguin King by dancing in the moonlight wearing a necklace of ears and eyeballs, all of it seen through the sights of a police marksman positioned on the roof of a neighbour’s evacuated home.

 

But this year, the John Lewis ad has been overshadowed by gargantuan supermarket and noted humanitarian anti-war campaigner J Sainsbury PLC, and its tear-jerking period piece in which a perfectly good war is ruined by a tragic outbreak of football.

 

Shivering in a frosty trench – or “the frozen aisle”, in Sainsbury’s parlance – they pause to sing Silent Night, have a kickaround with their German counterparts, and bond over a chocolate bar. It’s all very poignant, if you mentally delete the bit where a supermarket logo hovers over the killing fields, which you can’t.

 

Boringly, the advert stops short of showing us the events of the following day, when war was resumed and they reverted to bayoneting one another in the face. Nectar points for each headshot, lads! Kill two Jerries, get one free!

 

Millions of young men were slaughtered during the first world war – “body-bagged for life”, in Sainsbury’s parlance – and doubtless as they lay dying in foreign fields, gazing down at what remained of their mud-caked, punctured, broken bodies, gasping their final agonised breaths, it would have been a great source of comfort for them to know their noble sacrifice would still be honoured a century later, in an advert for a shop.

 

Next year they’re doing the Sharpeville Massacre.

 

Advertising aside, another new Yuletide signifier is “Black Friday”, a shopping tradition that began in the US and is now apparently “a thing” over here, at least according to press releases masquerading as news items. Every year, on the first Friday after Thanksgiving, hordes of deranged shoppers bite, kick and mutilate each other in a bid to get their hands on discounted consumer products. It’s like watching piranhas strip a cow down to its skeleton, but marginally less civilised. I used to think it would take a lot to make civil society break down completely – airborne Ebola, say, or a limited nuclear exchange. But no. In reality, the promise of 15% off a Transformers Stomp & Chomp dinosaur is enough to turn neighbour on neighbour in a bare-knuckle fight to the death. Of course, it’s possible the footage of brawling customers has been faked by online retailers, to encourage us to stay at home and click our way to bankruptcy instead. Wouldn’t be surprised.

 

This year, the top Christmas products include My Friend Cayla, billed as “the world’s first internet-connected doll”, something humankind has been crying out for since the earliest days of the abacus. My Friend Cayla is several furlongs beyond nightmarish. Technology has taken a familiar horror movie staple – the self-aware talking doll that suddenly addresses you by name, even when you haven’t pulled its string – and made it a chilling reality.

 

Yes, Cayla is no ordinary talking doll. She “knows almost everything”, according to the jingle. That’s because she can Google things with her Bluetooth-enabled, computerised mind. She’s essentially Siri in the form of a plastic child, or, as the website puts it, “the doll you can talk to like a real friend!” – which is true, assuming your conversations with your real friends consist of you issuing basic commands and demanding answers to factual questions.

 

The promotional material shows children asking Cayla nothing more taxing than “How do I bake a cake?” or “What is the tallest animal?” No one uses her to Google medical symptoms or ask for the latest on Isis, although presumably you could, and the news would be all the more disturbing for being recounted by a cold, expressionless plastic child whose eyes and lips don’t even move. Come to think of it, put like that, I’ve just realised she’s the ideal newsreader.

 

She’s the ideal spy, too. The moment I saw her, I realised there was a chilling near-future horror script to be written about an internet-enabled talking doll that reports back on everything you and your family get up to, to the government, to retailers, and to random hackers in Belarus. So at least I’ve got a future Black Mirror episode out of it. Fingers crossed I can finish the fictional version before the 3D documentary adaptation is launched in our waking reality. Charlie Brooker The Guardian

[Smirking_Saint]

Hey, remember when Christmas used to last 12 days? Now it’s so bloated it’s virtually an epoch, lasting twice as long as the year it falls in. The early-warning signs keep changing: not so long ago the start of the holiday season was signified by the release of the Christmas edition of the Radio Times. Now it’s the annual unveiling of the John Lewis ad, which this year features a boy arranging for a trafficked overseas bird to be smuggled into the country inside a small container and presented like a gift-wrapped object to the laddish penguin mate who exists only in his troubled mind. They say psychopathic murderers often start their “careers” by doing ghastly things to animals: hopefully they’ll keep the storyline going year after year, as his illusory brain-penguin commands him to carry out increasingly hideous yuletide ceremonies, until eventually the advert consists of nothing but him appeasing the Penguin King by dancing in the moonlight wearing a necklace of ears and eyeballs, all of it seen through the sights of a police marksman positioned on the roof of a neighbour’s evacuated home.

 

But this year, the John Lewis ad has been overshadowed by gargantuan supermarket and noted humanitarian anti-war campaigner J Sainsbury PLC, and its tear-jerking period piece in which a perfectly good war is ruined by a tragic outbreak of football.

 

Shivering in a frosty trench – or “the frozen aisle”, in Sainsbury’s parlance – they pause to sing Silent Night, have a kickaround with their German counterparts, and bond over a chocolate bar. It’s all very poignant, if you mentally delete the bit where a supermarket logo hovers over the killing fields, which you can’t.

 

Boringly, the advert stops short of showing us the events of the following day, when war was resumed and they reverted to bayoneting one another in the face. Nectar points for each headshot, lads! Kill two Jerries, get one free!

 

Millions of young men were slaughtered during the first world war – “body-bagged for life”, in Sainsbury’s parlance – and doubtless as they lay dying in foreign fields, gazing down at what remained of their mud-caked, punctured, broken bodies, gasping their final agonised breaths, it would have been a great source of comfort for them to know their noble sacrifice would still be honoured a century later, in an advert for a shop.

 

Next year they’re doing the Sharpeville Massacre.

 

Advertising aside, another new Yuletide signifier is “Black Friday”, a shopping tradition that began in the US and is now apparently “a thing” over here, at least according to press releases masquerading as news items. Every year, on the first Friday after Thanksgiving, hordes of deranged shoppers bite, kick and mutilate each other in a bid to get their hands on discounted consumer products. It’s like watching piranhas strip a cow down to its skeleton, but marginally less civilised. I used to think it would take a lot to make civil society break down completely – airborne Ebola, say, or a limited nuclear exchange. But no. In reality, the promise of 15% off a Transformers Stomp & Chomp dinosaur is enough to turn neighbour on neighbour in a bare-knuckle fight to the death. Of course, it’s possible the footage of brawling customers has been faked by online retailers, to encourage us to stay at home and click our way to bankruptcy instead. Wouldn’t be surprised.

 

This year, the top Christmas products include My Friend Cayla, billed as “the world’s first internet-connected doll”, something humankind has been crying out for since the earliest days of the abacus. My Friend Cayla is several furlongs beyond nightmarish. Technology has taken a familiar horror movie staple – the self-aware talking doll that suddenly addresses you by name, even when you haven’t pulled its string – and made it a chilling reality.

 

Yes, Cayla is no ordinary talking doll. She “knows almost everything”, according to the jingle. That’s because she can Google things with her Bluetooth-enabled, computerised mind. She’s essentially Siri in the form of a plastic child, or, as the website puts it, “the doll you can talk to like a real friend!” – which is true, assuming your conversations with your real friends consist of you issuing basic commands and demanding answers to factual questions.

 

The promotional material shows children asking Cayla nothing more taxing than “How do I bake a cake?” or “What is the tallest animal?” No one uses her to Google medical symptoms or ask for the latest on Isis, although presumably you could, and the news would be all the more disturbing for being recounted by a cold, expressionless plastic child whose eyes and lips don’t even move. Come to think of it, put like that, I’ve just realised she’s the ideal newsreader.

 

She’s the ideal spy, too. The moment I saw her, I realised there was a chilling near-future horror script to be written about an internet-enabled talking doll that reports back on everything you and your family get up to, to the government, to retailers, and to random hackers in Belarus. So at least I’ve got a future Black Mirror episode out of it. Fingers crossed I can finish the fictional version before the 3D documentary adaptation is launched in our waking reality.

 

You ok now ? **** me you must me an absolute joy

 

[sadoldgit]

It made me smile.

[Bearsy]

Is that your own work, sog? I rather enjoyed it!

 

Edit - sorry, that sounds like I'm faintly surprised, it's not at all that I think you incapable of producing long + interesting effort posts, it's just that i wouldn't normally expect you to deign to do so on here

 

Edit2 - oh, I read the Smirking quote one, which was un-attributed. The reference to you writing future episodes of Black Mirror, makes more sense now!

Edited 25 November, 2014 by Bearsy

[sadoldgit]

No Bearsy, I borrowed it from Charlie Brooker. I'd love to be able to churn that stuff out and get paid for it though!

[trousers]

[video=youtube_share;7SLV2yNhhgU]

[pap]

I've been listening to Dan Carlin's Hard Core History podcasts.

 

Anyone with an interest in the Great War really needs to have a listen to the Blueprint For Armageddon series. It covers the entire war period, but does devote some time to the Yuletide fraternisation in 1914. Was never allowed to happen again; the generals made sure of it.

[sadoldgit]

You can understand why but it just shows that occasionally basic decent humanity can shine through no matter what the circumstances.

[Whitey Grandad]

I've been listening to Dan Carlin's Hard Core History podcasts.

 

Anyone with an interest in the Great War really needs to have a listen to the Blueprint For Armageddon series. It covers the entire war period, but does devote some time to the Yuletide fraternisation in 1914. Was never allowed to happen again; the generals made sure of it.

 

Someone made a point on Radio 4 yesterday morning. If this had happened in today's world with all the social media coverage the war would have ended there and then.

[Patrick Bateman]

Hey, remember ... misery, whinge, miserable, moan, rar rar rar ... reality. Charlie Brooker The Guardian

 

I can't stand him, he really is the most miserable f**ker that exists, as summed up by this miserable post.

[sadoldgit]

Someone made a point on Radio 4 yesterday morning. If this had happened in today's world with all the social media coverage the war would have ended there and then.

 

Nice thought but don't think so. The generals made sure it never happened again and it was only in certain place along the line.

[Halo Stickman]

Someone made a point on Radio 4 yesterday morning. If this had happened in today's world with all the social media coverage the war would have ended there and then.

 

That’s an interesting idea, but I suspect that the 1914 Christmas truce was too short-lived and the top-brass too quick to stamp out the fraternisation for any kind of social media coverage to have had much of an effect.

 

Imo, what is more pertinent with regard to possible social media coverage is something that is claimed to have happened in the book Trench Warfare 1914–1918. The Live and Let Live System by Tony Ashworth referenced on the Wikipedia Christmas truce page.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_truce

 

Although the popular tendency has been to see the December 1914 Christmas Truces as unique and therefore of romantic rather than political significance, they have also been interpreted as part of the widespread non-cooperation with the war spirit and conduct by serving soldiers. In his book on trench warfare, historian Tony Ashworth describes what he calls the 'live and let live system.' Complicated local truces and agreements not to fire at each other were developed by men along the front throughout the war. These often began with agreement not to attack each other at tea, meal or washing times, and in some places became so developed that whole sections of the front would see few casualties for extended periods of time. This system, Ashworth argues, 'gave soldiers some control over the conditions of their existence.' The December 1914 Christmas Truces then can be seen as not unique, but as the most dramatic example of non-cooperation with the war spirit that included refusal to fight, unofficial truces, mutinies, strikes, and peace protests.

 

It’s interesting to speculate what might have happened if social media coverage had been available at that time to help encourage a more widespread and entrenched (no pun intended) adoption of this ‘live and let live system’ – arguably, the more widespread and entrenched this practice became amongst serving soldiers on both sides of the conflict, the more difficult it would have been for the top-brass to reinsert the ‘kill and be killed system’.

[sadoldgit]

Very interesting and not something I have heard of before. War by its definition seems to defy the normal rules of living so it would seem strange that hostilities would only take place at certain times. Given that both sides spent so much time shelling and shooting each other the concept of not firing when people are having a brew seems odd!

[Verbal]

Very interesting and not something I have heard of before. War by its definition seems to defy the normal rules of living so it would seem strange that hostilities would only take place at certain times. Given that both sides spent so much time shelling and shooting each other the concept of not firing when people are having a brew seems odd!

 

You've got this exactly the wrong way round. Even in war, soldiers have a really difficult time killing each other. That's why the Christmas truce happened in the first place - and why a lot of military training is geared to trying to overcome this deep-seated reluctance.

 

Humans, like practically all other animals, are hard-wired not to harm members of their own species. And this applies even in war, when death seems to be all around. In the Vietnam War, for example, the ammunition-to-death rate was 52,000 bullets to 1 dead person. Either the Vietcong and North Vietnamese were superhumanly resilient or the Americans weren't really trying that hard.

 

No wonder you didn't get the ad.

 

On that thought, Happy Christmas.

[bridge too far]

A historian who has specialised in the Christmas Day Truce thinks it unlikely that the 'football match' happened in 1914 as, at that time, only professional soldiers were involved in the fighting and it would have been counter to their training to fraternise with the enemy in such a way.

 

He thinks it is more likely to have taken place later in the war when conscripts were involved.

[sadoldgit]

I did get the ad Verbal, I just thought it wasn't appropriate. I also studied WW1 for A level and whilst I knew about the 1914 truce at certain points in the line I didn't know that at other times there were agreements to cease hostilities. As for soldiers (humans) having a hard time killing one another, it happens every day of the year and the countless millions that have died in the countless wars over the centuries would seem to indicate that we find it all too easy to kill one another.

 

Still, it should be a day of peaceful contemplation so on that note I wish you and yours a very merry and peaceful Christmas.

[Batman]

People who say it didn't happen, go against others describing the event who were there. Seen interviews from 1964 of old boys, who were actually there (there service history backed it up) telling the story of how it happened on the day

[Verbal]

I did get the ad Verbal, I just thought it wasn't appropriate. I also studied WW1 for A level and whilst I knew about the 1914 truce at certain points in the line I didn't know that at other times there were agreements to cease hostilities. As for soldiers (humans) having a hard time killing one another, it happens every day of the year and the countless millions that have died in the countless wars over the centuries would seem to indicate that we find it all too easy to kill one another.

Still, it should be a day of peaceful contemplation so on that note I wish you and yours a very merry and peaceful Christmas.

 

Thank you. And as a gift, a suggestion - probably the best book written on why the highlighted sentence is one of the great misperceptions of our age.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Better-Angels-Our-Nature/dp/0141034645

[View From The Top]

I did get the ad Verbal, I just thought it wasn't appropriate. I also studied WW1 for A level and whilst I knew about the 1914 truce at certain points in the line I didn't know that at other times there were agreements to cease hostilities. As for soldiers (humans) having a hard time killing one another, it happens every day of the year and the countless millions that have died in the countless wars over the centuries would seem to indicate that we find it all too easy to kill one another.

 

Still, it should be a day of peaceful contemplation so on that note I wish you and yours a very merry and peaceful Christmas.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-30433729

[sadoldgit]

Thank you. And as a gift, a suggestion - probably the best book written on why the highlighted sentence is one of the great misperceptions of our age.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Better-Angels-Our-Nature/dp/0141034645

 

Thank you Verbal. I shall add this to my to read list!

[sadoldgit]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-30433729

 

Thanks VFTT. Interesting read.

[sadoldgit]

Sainsburys have posted their worst Christmas figures for 10 years. Not suggesting it was anything to do with the ad but perhaps they would have been better off spending the money on a few high profile loss leaders to get punters though the door? I shopped in Tescos this year but only because a) they are closer b) I have a load of vouchers and c) they were giving 25% off three bottles of wine or more. I couldnt even tell you what the Tescos ad was all about (apart from being Christmassy)!

[whelk]

Sainsburys have posted their worst Christmas figures for 10 years. Not suggesting it was anything to do with the ad but perhaps they would have been better off spending the money on a few high profile loss leaders to get punters though the door? I shopped in Tescos this year but only because a) they are closer b) I have a load of vouchers and c) they were giving 25% off three bottles of wine or more. I couldnt even tell you what the Tescos ad was all about (apart from being Christmassy)!

 

If your point is that Tesco were smarter than Sainsburys in their advertising spend because you went there regardless or did you just want to share a titbit?

You probably saw that Moody's downgraded Tesco stock to 'junk' status?

[sadoldgit]

My point is that all supermarkets seem to be heaving at Christmas so what is the point in advertising at that time of year? I didnt make my choice based on an advert. I made my choice on locality and the fact that I saved a few quid. I appreciate that they all fight for market share at Christmas but I dont think a clever ad makes the slightest bit of difference.

[whelk]

Maybe this year's John Lewis one has more resonance SOG?

 

http://youtu.be/wuz2ILq4UeA

[sadoldgit]

Maybe this year's John Lewis one has more resonance SOG?

 

http://youtu.be/wuz2ILq4UeA

 

Ah, that will be an age thing! Actually I am very unhappy with this ad. It clearly encourages paedophilia. What is a young girl doing sending an old man a telescope so that he can spy on her from afar? I have already written to my MP about this appalling advert.