This post is part of my 30 blogs in 30 days series. More details here.
Selling stuff is hard. People who have money, would rarely part with it without reason. So sometimes you just have to invent reasons, so people may buy your wares. This is called commercial propaganda advertising. Sometimes these are so effectively they can change the perception of reality. Presented here are 3 such inventions.
Human Pheromones
Human pheromones, as depicted by marketing materials, do not exist. There is very little evidence of humans secreting any hormones that could be categorized as attractive pheromones. The source of this misinformation comes from a company trying to sell human pheromones.
Halitosis
Halitosis is not a real disease. It was invented by the sellers of Listerine. Listerine was a floor cleaner that they wanted to market as a mouth wash. Bad Breath is not a specific problem. Everyone has bad breath in the morning. Some have bad bread breath due to something they ate.
By inventing a Disease, they could easily market their product as a solution. ‘You have bad breath? Must be this totally real-sounding disease. Use our product to het rid of it.’
Anti-bacterial Soap
It does not kill bacteria. In the long term it makes bacteria stronger. Until recently, antibacterial soap had the chemical Triclosan, an anti-microbial agent. But in such a low quantity as to have no advantage over regular soap at killing bacteria on your hands.
The minute quantity of triclosan from each wash does accumulate in the sewage. This concentration kills most of the weaker bacterium, causing anti-biotic resistant strains to survive. The major soap brands have switched other anti-microbial agents, which also seem to have no effect, when compared to regular soap.
There are many more lies that pepper the world of advertising. 90% of your possessions are trash-in-waiting and somebody convinced you to buy all of them through similar subterfuge and manipulation. They used similar tactics as before.