Like a lot of successful, improbable marketing campaigns, the sale of tap water isn’t so much about outright lying as it is about the powerful, engineered management of truth. (That’s a fine line, I know, but its benefits show up mainly in court.) It’s done to us all the time, and not only in commercials, but also in the news, to a far more devastating effect.
I don’t think it’s stupidity that leads us to pay $2.00 per pint for the very same thing that costs a fraction of a penny per gallon in our own kitchen. But it’s a great example of how we’re led to believe in things, on the faulty assumption that the leaders’ objectives are as pure as our own.
There’s a lot of money to be made in the betrayal of public trust, and a lot of power to be had. It’s been a costly lesson, but at least I’ve learned it before too many years went by. If I really want to trust my water, I’ll filter it myself.
And I started filtering my news a long time ago.
-jh
From The Economist
SO THE emperor really isn’t wearing any clothes. Last week PepsiCo announced that the label on its Aquafina brand of bottled water will soon carry the words “public water source”, instead of simply the innocent looking “P.W.S.”. That’s right: Aquafina is to all intents and purposes tap water. Coca-Cola is under pressure to follow suit with its Dasani brand, though so far it is refusing to do so.
