Advertisements have started in the ancient times, ever since there is more than one provider of the same goods or services. For example, two shops may be adjacent to each other and each store owner cuts the price of their goods and services to attract customers to their store. This is already a form of advertisement. In fact, advertisement started at this stage, albeit being simple and crude. Since then, advertisements have evolved into various mutations, ranging from TV ads to internet ads and even real people dressing themselves as the product meant for advertisement! Nevertheless, one identical rationale which is common in all these forms of advertisements and even through these years is to spread propaganda to the consumers.

Advertisements may not always work towards our benefit, because of the common rationale mentioned earlier. In order for the advertisement to succeed, it must prove to the consumers that the company and its products are a mark above the rest. To do this, it must obviously crush the other companies and their advertisements, if not their rivals would be on par or even be better than them. Take for example the Colgate toothpaste company advertisements, which always stresses the benefits of their toothpaste over conventional toothpastes, thus propelling Colgate toothpastes while forcing the conventional toothpaste to lag behind them. Moreover, in the process of doing so, most companies would compromise the moral standards of society for economic gain, in turn neglecting the benefit of us consumers.

In order to portray its own products in good light, even if the company's product really deserves the consumer's purchase, its advertisement has to be biased towards its own product. Most companies would make sure that the advertisement balls down to the central thesis point that its product is always one notch above its competitors, for the same price. In today's open economy, society believes in the survival of the fittest. As a result, advertisements need to show that its company is 'fit'. Some companies even explicit announce that it is the best, like Carlsberg. Carlsberg's slogan, 'probably the best wine in the world' is certainly the epitome of this group of advertisements. A visit to its corporate website would even reveal that it takes pride in this slogan, adapting it for further usage such as 'probably the best website in the world'. This restricts the consumer's right to evaluate a spectrum of different companies, to compare different companies and to decide on which product to buy, because such advertisements direct the consumer's attention to a specific company only. In the case of tobacco sales, this phenomenon would lead to more dire consequences. Some tobacco companies are so obsessed with generating enough revenue from tobacco sales that they have lost all sense of society responsibility. It is a known fact that any tobacco, even the 'healthiest' one, would lead to various complications such as heart attacks, yellow teeth, looking older, miscarriage etc. However, these evil advertisement managers proclaim that their tobacco is 'healthier'. In reality, their toacco would not be any healthier, because the health issues by smoking their tobacco would only arise longer than smoking conventional tobacco, but it would still occur in the long run. Moreover, the play on the word 'healthy' would lead to a misconception to the average smoker that this is a healthy smoke, which in itself is an oxymoron. Hence, although this mechanism helps to achieve the rationale of an advertisement, it does not benefit the consumer in any way and even harms them in the case of tobacco.

For the set of companies which advertise in a biased way, there is a subset of companies who employ exaggeration as their strategy in the battlefield of advertisement. These companies generally lack substance in their products. Lacking in substance can appear in a number of ways. To name a few, some products are completely useless and have no originality, or have defects which is detrimental to the product sales. Exaggeration serves as a veil to these problems in the product. For example, Beijing 101's famous advertisement focuses on the hair of an individual before and after treatment. For the critical thinker, the stark contrast would raise uncertainty about the service that Beijing 101 brings. Firstly, we are not sure of the individual's identity. Have we wondered if he is an employee of Beijing 101 spreading untrue information about the service? Secondly, have we considered the side effects of such treatment, which is long term and would only surface years after the treatment? Beijing 101's service may not necessarily be all harmful, but the advertisement is indeed exaggerating the beneficial aspects of the service to such an extent that consumers are unknowingly steered away cleverly from the possible harms of Beijing 101's service, owing them a full picture of the service provided and hindering the consumers ability to make an informed decision by weighing the pros and the cons. Taking the example of tobacco sales again, heartless advertisement managers exaggerate on a different scale. In contrast to Beijing 101's exaggeration of the benefits of their service, tobacco companies scale down the impacts of smoking. This is evident from companies abiding to the minimum that the law requires. Under the law, tobacco packets are instructed to display warning messages such as 'Smoking kills' on the cigarette pack. However, in the preliminary stages since this law was implemented, this notice was so miniscule that a magnifying glass is required to even make out the gist of the message. Government authorities have since then amended the law such that the notice need to be of a certain area. But even so, tobacco companies publish these notices just at the correct size. As we can see from these two examples, exaggeration obviously does not benefit the consumer at all.

Nonetheless, we have only discussed in the shoes of the consumer. By taking another angle and evaluating the situation in the shoes of the manager of the company, we can experience the stress liberated from our employer, to generate as much revenue as possible. Especially in this economic downturn, employees tend to obey employers as faithfully as ever, to prevent themselves from being washed away with the economic tsunami. In a typical scenario when the employer instructs the employee to start an adertisement campaign, the employee would not question the employer but the work tirelessly at the advertisement. In this competitive society, sometimes we may have no choice but the sacrifice a little of the moral obligation in order to secure our lives. However, I strongly urge everyone not to go overboard in doing so and making sure that such acts are reserved to the last resort. We should also constantly remind ourselves not to use this method to improve our living conditions, but merely to secure it.

Lastly, consumers need to exercise their discretion too. Advertisements are there to coax us consumers to purchasing their goods and services, but the decision still lies in our hands. We can decide whether to make that trip down to the shop or not. We can also decide whether to believe the advertisements or not. Sadly, advertisements are here to stay for as long as an economy is open. By thinking critically, we can avoid the pitfalls that these advertisements lay for us and not fall prey to the companies vying for innocent consumers.

In conclusion, advertisements use tactics such as biasedness and exaggeration to win the hearts of consumers. Consumers should retaliate by thinking critically and provide themselves with opportunities to have a macroview on different companies. They should not agree blindly to advertisements and be more savvy.