Welcome to "disastertising": How advertising amid the coronavirus got weird fast

The Atlantic

Over the past two months, the "abrupt pivots to the pandemic in television commercials, social-media posts, and marketing emails have been hard to ignore," says Amanda Mull. "It’s jarring to see advertisers, usually so optimistic about their products as a means to improve lives or grant happiness, forced to acknowledge that things in America are broadly terrible. Some viewers have noted an unsettlingly similar solemnity across brands’ pledges to protect and serve their clientele. Others have found comfort in the commercials’ shoddy earnestness; if America’s salespeople have no choice but to share in everyone’s uncertainty, then maybe the country is mostly united after all. Together, these ads reveal a pandemic dystopia with a particularly American twist. With unpredictable government-aid coffers, most companies that want to remain solvent through an extended catastrophe will have to master the precarious, high-stakes art of disastertising. To do it, they’ll need to persuade you that giving them your money is an act of solidarity." ALSO: To be fair, advertising anything right now is a high-wire act.