The uncanny relationship between the Brexit and decline of many a creative agency

The beauty of democracy is that votes are like assholes….everyone has one.

Whether you studied at Oxford or dropped out of school with no qualifications your vote is equal. Trying to say that because some one is uneducated means their vote doesn’t count is absolute BS.

The reason why people voted remain is pepper throughout your article. The lack of respect and almost naked condescension of those supporting Remain to those voting Exit. You characterise those who voted exit as uneducated, and fail remember that less education (especially tertiary and beyond) doesn’t always mean less intelligent. You characterise their position as irrational and fail to even consider the arguments put forward by the Exit campaign. Independence, sovereignty and autonomy are rational arguments. They have trade offs of course. But people weighed those trade offs and decided that independence was preferable to the benefits offered by continued codependency with Europe.

In addition to voting for independence the UK also voted against the technocratic nature of the EU. They voted against the assumption that highly educated but unelected bureaucrats in Brussels know what is best for them than they do themselves. The same assumption is implicit in this article.

If you don’t recognise this assumption and if you don’t respect those who disagree with you, you will continue to lose these kinds of elections.

Additionally, your information test for voters is a disgusting idea. Many citizens of many countries around the world are not well educated or have the resources to be well informed. Should women in Sub-Saharan African countries like Burkina Faso be barred from voting because they are not fully informed? Should their votes count only half as much as men’s because they recieved only half as much education?

The right to vote is the defining fundamental right of democracy. and should not be infringed or diminished under any circumstances. Low information voters present a problem, but the solution should not be a violation of the inalienable right to vote and have it count as much as everyone else’s.

Fantastic, let’s implement something that’s not only controversial but undemocratic. Your idea essentialy restricts people of lesser intelligence, most likely from a poor socio-economic background, the right to have a full vote. There are many problems with this.

Here’s a more achievable suggestion: why not target the underpresented youth who didn’t show up to vote, a group sizeable enough to bring the vote to Remain?

I get what the author is trying to say here but I fail to see why his grandpa’s vote for the Sex Party was indicative of a bogan or uninformed vote. As far as I read it they are trying to get voluntary euthanasia legal, as well as taxing and legalising marijuana as per Colorado and six other US states. I think they also go for marriage equality and taxing religious institutions. I’m sorry but your grandpa seems pretty enlightened actually.

Perfectly captures the thinking of an inner city socialist; everyone is free to vote, but unless you do it like me you’re wrong. I don’t think smart CX design can disguise this opinion.

I also think the author has forgotten what the C stands for in CX.

CX is designed to help the customer. The voting process is currently far from perfect with more boxes to number than is imaginable, adding 5 questions will only frustrate people even more and turn them off from voting.

Can we just use the age old excuse of ‘nobody understands their audience’?

Also The Australian Sex Party and One Nation are on different ends of the spectrum. Seriously what was with the vote? It’s EXACTLY like the people who voted to leave and then had to Google what the EU was.

Horrified.

Here it all is once again, the reasoning, the platitudes, the politics and the so called practical logic.
The vote will be a great leveler as always, because there are intelligent and unintelligent people everywhere, both educated and uneducated, each and every one of which, believes that he/she/ those who would be one or the other, those who are both, and those who are not sure, knows what is best for all.

The mystery box example is nearest to the truth, just as it was with our latest referendum on the possibility of becoming a republic; except that thank goodness there were not enough of them to tip it over, as the loony voters went for the undecided future, and voted to change to the probably irreversible unknown, just because they had been told by those who’s joy it is to stir up the loonies, that this was their chance to get rid of the queen, her influence and her head from our coinage. That is all it took to make them vote yes. Fortunately, common sense prevailed.

Okay fellow Mumbrellites,

More than happy to engage with any comments left on the page – pertaining to democratic process or the challenges creative agencies face at this moment in time.

That said, the former has elicited some strong opinions and heated dialogue directed towards myself. More than comfortable with this, but I will not respond to any comments made without the author providing their full name for obvious reasons.

Cheers

DBF

“I have an issue with people voting for things when they have little to no idea about what the consequences of their vote may be.”

Isn’t that the basis of each parties campaign – presenting the “consequences” of not voting for them? And isn’t it easier now for the parties to target and tailor their message to make sure that people that they want to be aware of these consequences are? So isn’t everyone quite aware of “consequences” already and choose to vote based on what they wish to occur? I’m not sure how you could ever qualify critical thought.

In the Brexit example, there is no way to know if anyone will get to say ‘I told you so’, and in any case the very act of observing this experiment will affect any result, so I have to agree with some commenters that say it is a rather arrogant view you take that the result was only due to “uneducated” voters. They were educated by the campaigns and their life up until that point. If you are saying that it’s not fair that the result happened because people were lied to, who are you to decide what is considered true?

From a CX point of view in regards to elections, this reminds me of how the Republican party raised the cost of participation for elections for minorities in order to win, or how their caucuses are designed to raise the ‘quality’ of voter turnout by being time consuming and archaic. Do you see the similarities in what you are proposing?
Great thought provoking article though and more of this Mumbrella.

I’m also very uncomfortable with the presumptive elitism some commenters have implied this article promotes, however I don’t think this is what the author was intending at all (as confirmed in follow-up comments).

We in fact already have a system in place that serves as a safeguard against simple majority (mob) rule, one that protects those minority groups from potentially harmful legislation: it’s called representative parliamentary democracy. Our ‘one-person-one-vote’ system actually elects legislators: it doesn’t decide on individual policies (or at least, cf. the imminent plebiscite on same-sex marriage, it shouldn’t).

That’s up to our representatives whom – as (supposedly) informed individuals devoting their professional lives to understanding complex policy implications – we elect to make decisions on our behalf, while we’re busy getting on with our daily lives. Are those in favour of simple majority rule here saying our current system is wrong? If so, should every adult citizen go to a compulsory vote on every single policy issue, local, state and federal? Or just some? Which ones? And how would anyone ever do any other work?

Expertise on any issue, especially one as intricately Byzantine as foreign/trade/immigration etc. policy, is extremely important, and it comes from being able to devote enough time to think the ramifications through, something most people don’t have because they have to put food in the fridge and pay the mortgage/rent. Would you let Joe Bloggs give you a double heart bypass? How about take the controls of the 747 you’re travelling on? Of course not: we leave those things to people who have devoted enough time to getting them right. Why not extremely complex public policy?

Hi Mikko,

Firstly, thanks for engaging in the discussion and putting your name behind your thoughts – it takes courage to engage in politicised debates in an accountable way.

To your comments, upon revision of the piece, one thing I feel was perhaps slightly remiss of me was to say ‘uneducated voters’ instead of more clearly articulating that those who voted leave were relatively less educated to those who voted remain – this is what the data tells us. Just to reinforce my p.o.v on this, please read over my first reply to Fraser.

Beyond that, in response to your comments, I will respectfully disagree with the points you make such as “Isn’t that the basis of each parties campaign – presenting the “consequences” of not voting for them?” and “isn’t everyone quite aware of “consequences” already and choose to vote based on what they wish to occur?”

You clearly seem engaged in American politics from the tail end of your comment. To your point on ‘presenting consequences’ and people being ‘aware’ of what will happen if a party is elected, I’ll bring into focus none other than the way the Donald has been operating during his tilt at the Republican nomination. The Donald has frequently contradicted (and chopped and changed) his position on a variety of issues, which to another of your points, has been largely done to target different audiences and win their approval. Just because a politician / political party preaches their beliefs, it doesn’t mean that what their saying isn’t complete bullshit.

To the above point, when I say ‘consequences’ in my piece, I’m angling at a more objective, politically neutral and definitive outcomes, but again – and it’s getting a bit tiresome referring back to asterisk #2 now – I did not write this article (an article in a marketing publication) to discuss minutia of detail around how something like this would work and don’t intend on going into such details in this forum given this was never my intention.

Thanks for your commentary, and again, I tilt the hat to the fact that you’ve done so in an accountable manner.

Cheers

DBF

I don’t even understand what the screener would contain, as nobody truly knows the consequences of Brexit yet… Some argue it’s short term pain, with potential for long term gain, some say it’s pain all around, and some experts will simply confess we are just set for a longer period of uncertainty.

But regardless of the consequences you talk about, there are perfectly rational arguments for the people of the UK to vote to leave the EU. You, or I, may disagree with these reasons, but it doesn’t make us more rational than those voters. As someone else pointed out, sovereignty, independence and autonomy are all rational reasons, and there are also perfectly logical arguments around less bureaucracy and more local decision making, and simply, being against un-democratically elected officials determine your destiny.

No matter how you spin it, at the end of the day, your ideas are incredibly undemocratic. And it doesn’t surprise me that your reaction to a perfectly sensible argument previously posted here is to ask for their real name.

The premise that we use the ballot paper to sort the wheat from the chaff reeks of eugenics. The assumption that anyone can point with any certainty as to the ramifications of any policy implementation, that fails to anticipate any ‘unknown unknowns’ which might influence this implementation, that fails to acknowledge that we don’t all share the same desired outcomes, is heuristic thinking at its most heuristic.

If you’re going to propose five ‘neutral’ questions, I’d suggest you take some time to try and draft one or two to get a better idea of how fallacious and naive this premise is, rather than shunt the most substantive aspect of your argument to the end of the piece with an ‘all care, no responsibility’ disclaimer.

This is a really worrying piece.

I am very interested in the whole media influence over the Brexit vote. What do the billionaires want for themselves? Murdoch (owner of The Times and The Sun), backed leave. Murdoch is known to loathe his lack of power in Europe and a Britain that doesn’t have to answer to Europe means he wields more power. Check out this interview with Murdoch and Standard journo Andrew Hilton: “I once asked Rupert Murdoch why he was so opposed to the European Union. “That’s easy,” he replied. “When I go into Downing Street they do what I say; when I go to Brussels they take no notice.”
http://www.standard.co.uk/comm.....89151.html

As well as Murdoch’s papers. The papers of the Jersey living, tax exiles the Barclay Brothers are also pro Brexit. Again, I can only imagine that these Billionaires are in the same mindset as Murdoch.

Richard Desmond, who owns The Star and The Express (both pro leave) has donated hundreds of thousands to UKIP in the past.

I would love to read a nice summarised article, even dare I say it (for easy digestion) an info-graphic, which explains which media backed remain and leave and then profiles the readers, listeners, viewers of these papers and stations.

I am from the UK, however now live in Australia for good. It would certainly seem that the people who are citing and sharing articles to Facebook from The Express, The Sun or The Telegraph are using these articles to say to the world “see!” and “I told you so”. They seem very much influenced by these papers and other media.

Mumbrella: It would be great if you could pen a useful article about the influence of media. Who owns what media and what is the agenda of these moguls?

My personal opinion, from seeing so many pro leave people citing dross from biased and evident agenda serving papers, is that the billionaires got the result they want and these billionaires can continue to tell Downing St what to do.

Nothing is perfect. The EU isn’t perfect, however it does seem to have been used as a smokescreen to win the leave campaign. In or out of Europe British governments have stripped back funding to essential services, which affect the lives of the working classes.

Again, Mumbrella: you could create a really useful article detailing the media landscape. I would share it… Let’s educate the masses, so that they can truly make informed decisions.

I share the view that your suggestions to amend the voting process are disgusting, and represent the noxious and somewhat scary views coming out of the self-styled technocracy in San Francisco and their wannabes. As if some more enlightened people are more entitled to vote for our elected representatives. Frankly, get over yourself.

Oh, the irony – man whose grandfather fought against a political ideology which imposed its will on others has own grandson attempt to do the same. To make sure his ‘interests are protected’ of course, so it’s for his own good, really…

Wow. This has been one of the more engaging, contentious pieces I’ve seen on Mumbrella is a good while.

As someone who’s worked both client and agency side for over 10 years, it makes sense as to why nobody has commented on the creative agency thread in the piece, and that would be because I reckon the author is spot on. The best creative shops in town definitely go beyond purely comms these days, and they’re the ones you want to be working with.

Beyond that, I think if Bluzer-Fry genuinely wanted the thread to discuss the challenges that much of adland and many other creative agencies face, his mistake was pushing too far out with a pretty radical idea that looks to have it’s challenges and needs much more explanation than he’s provided in this forum. He probably would have been safer to stick to something like the fact that David Cameron could have designed two referendums to be done in a month, or force Leave to win minimum 60% threshold (or something similar) to help get the stay result he was looking for.

That said, looking at the responses to comments, I do like the fact that he’s at least put his name to something that he looks to care about and has sparked some engaged discussion around it. It’s amazing to see some of the vitriol that’s come out in this piece and the number of keyboard heroes who are more than willing to jump up and down with their own righteous opinions, yet lack the conviction to actually put their names to it. If we’re to believe the author about the fact that he chatted this through and got agreement with a 92 year old veteran – something I think we have to – then in my books, I’d say this masked criticism goes beyond the author to somebody who fought to protect the democratic privileges we have in Australia today. To me, slamming somebody in this position feels pretty gutless, and I reckon a few people should think about that and be ashamed for the way they’ve behaved.

Thanks for publishing Mumbrella, and more stuff that pushes the boundaries going forward please!

@Squaring up. You make a good point about process. Some of these issues; Brexit or same-sex marriage should actually be decisions made by government rather than the cowardly (or pandering) act of putting it directly to the populace. But if you think these responses to a contentious political proposal are anything approaching ‘vitriol’, you really need to get out more. The commenters’ disapproval of Daniel’s ideas have been expressed with conviction, but also with restraint. Do I really have to point you in the direction of genuine vitriolic attacks on social media?

The ‘truth’ about creative agencies is something that’s been discussed on Mumbrella many times, with many speaking up. You have misinterpreted the silence on that part of his piece, no-one here has been dumbstruck by this ‘uncanny’ truth. It’s a given that we all understand (which is why some of us creative types read this site as opposed the the other one), and the analogy with Brexit is tenuous to say the best. This is piece is poorly structured, poorly argued and poorly considered.

You say Daniel’s opinion should be applauded simply because he put his name on it? I’ll reserve my applause for substance of argument.

You can find me in other articles on Mumbrella that I write under my own full name and respond to comments under this abbreviated form.
So I’m not really hiding from anyone, but there’s no way I’m putting my surname in proximity to this piece. What about you?

To all the people “disgusted” by the author’s suggestion: why aren’t you disgusted that 17 year olds and 16 year olds can’t vote? And hell, why not 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4 and 3 year olds?
Zero to 2 year old might be a little too young, since they might struggle to even hold a pen – but surely the ones that can should have the very sacred right to vote too?
People with dementia have the right to vote (but a relative can have them removed from the roll). People with a severe intellectual disability can vote.
So why not a 3 year old? They can decide what they want to eat, so why not let them decide who governs us all?
In all honesty, I’d trust an intelligent 10 year old to have a much better understanding of the electoral system and important issues than many of the people who are (in many cases willfully) ignorant about politics.