Addendum: Later in the day this post was written. After a bit of a Twitter storm, The Los Angeles Times reports that General Motors is withdrawing the bicycle portion of their campaign. Which is great news, although it’s kind of like the rebels taking a minor city when Gaddafi stills controls Tripoli.
Thanks to the eagle eyes at the League of American Bicyclists, this General Motors campaign was spotted - and spanked accordingly. “Reality Sucks” is their campaign title. It offers discounts to college students who want to buy a car. This is another example of Copenhagenize’s “Car Industry Strikes Back” series. Most instances of the car industry, or automobile insurance companies, are subtle and use imagery to underline their point that cycling is geeky, only for poor souls and can’t compete with the sexed up car ownership world. This GM campaign spells it out, revealing the inner desires of the car industry faced with stiff and growing competition from bicycle traffic.
Stop Pedalling, Start Driving.
Yes. They’re worried. Yes. They’re desperately trying to cling on to a fast-changing market. No. They don’t seem very capable of doing so. It would be amusing if it wasn’t so pathetic.
GM has a list of Environmental Principles on their website. This is prime material for The Daily Show.
As a responsible corporate citizen, General Motors is dedicated to protecting human health, natural resources and the global environment. This dedication reaches further than compliance with the law to encompass the integration of sound environmental practices into our business decisions.
We are committed to actions to restore and preserve the environment. (Meaning: We’ll put tiny bandaids on the mass destruction we have caused over the past century in your cities and countryside. Oh, and the Great American Streetcar Scandal? No comment.)
We are committed to reducing waste and pollutants, conserving resources, and recycling materials at every stage of the product lifecycle. (Meaning: Because this will increase our profit margin) We will continue to participate actively in educating the public regarding environmental conservation (Meaning: we’ll do everything we can to manipulate people into staying in our cars and ridicule all other forms of transport). We will continue to pursue vigorously the development and implementation of technologies for minimizing pollutant emissions. (Meaning: As long as it stills involves oil and we can still keep selling cars)
We will continue to work with all governmental entities for the development of technically sound and financially responsible environmental laws and regulations. (Meaning: We will spend outrageous amounts of money lobbying politicians to keep them on our side)
Be sure to read Bike League’s piece on the GM campaign here.
Addendum: The next day after General Motors got caught in The Perfect Twitter Storm.
Giant bicycles produced this bicycle-friendly version of the ad.
