You'll Do It, But You Won't Like It.

As a marketing professional, one thing that has bothered me is how absolutely abysmal messaging has been in relation to the COVID response at all levels.

The White House, I understand. The concerted effort to undermine everything the current administration says—by the press and by professional bureaucrats—has been a constant since the moment this president took office.

But consider this. The first and hardest hit place in the US was New York City, home of Madison Avenue. The best, most talented and well resourced persuaders on the planet are in 

I mean, come on! The whole nation is convulsing over mask mandates and yet the glossy PSAs declaring "Wearing is Caring" or some such pithy slogan are nowhere to be seen.

What I'm saying is, the buy-in approach—the carrot as opposed to the stick—was discarded at the outset. I see no evidence it was ever really tried.

WHY?

The charitable side of me says the players involved didn't think of it. The uncharitable side says they want you to wear a mask, but they don't want you to want to. The inescapable agreement between those two sides is that the first impulse was to use force rather than urge cooperation.

So, go ahead. Call me crazy. But I saw this country pull together in a matter of hours less than 20 years ago after 9/11. That we can't do it today, over months, says that a lot of people—influential people—just don't want to.


ADDENDUM 1

I’m tired of mask mandates being called a “small ask.” Issuing a mandate isn’t asking, it’s telling. And nothing that applies to everyone is small.

ADDENDUM 2

The adversarial tone with regards to mask wearing! A headline from Omaha World Herald reads: “Get used to wearing a mask, Omahans—after 4-hour hearing, council unanimously passes mandate.” 

You hear that? Get used to it.

They (the paper's editors, it's ownership Berkshire Hathaway, the city leaders, probably even Peter Kiewit from beyond the grave) don’t want you to cheerfully go along. They want you to know it's an imposition, so they can chastise you for complaining. They don’t want your cooperation, they want your compliance.

ADDENDUM 3

We now have two observed models for how to beat the coronavirus in any given country:

1. Do everything right, including contact tracing, testing, closing the economy and schools, wearing masks, and social distancing.

and...

2. Don't do any of those fucking things.

— Scott Adams (@ScottAdamsSays) August 11, 2020

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