speech and respect - College of Social Sciences and International ...

The Illusion of Private Freedom
Murphy had an abortion "it would have been lights out." A Saatchi
& Saatchi executive was unashamed about advertiser influence:
"When we use TV, we're not using it to support First Amendment
rights or artistic freedoms, we're using it because it's a good business
decision for our client. . . ," 93
Advertiser anxiety can affect the marketability (and thus the
commercial speech) of celebrities. After Earvin "Magic" Johnson
disclosed he had AIDS, Pepsi, Nestle, Spalding, and Kentucky Fried
Chicken shunned him like the plague. A spokesperson for Target
Stores squirmed: "It's a real predicament; because of his situation
are we obliged to work with him forever?" (an unfortunate phrasing
given his dramatically shortened life expectancy). Pepsi equivocated:
"As a major advertiser, we need to rethink how to position
Magic in a way that's right for him and right for us." A New York
expert on celebrity advertising was more candid: "I don't think
[Magic] has a future in advertising new products. Advertisers don't
want to be associated with negatives. And this is a very solemn
negative. He might die." Nine months later, however, when Johnson
signed a $14.6 million contract with the Lakers for 1994/95—the
largest single season deal in team sports—Pepsi revived its "We
Believe in Magic" campaign, and athletic shoe manufacturers plotted
to lure him away from Converse. The publisher of Sporting
Goods Intelligence opined: "Reebok is the best bet. They're into all
that stuff like social responsibility and Amnesty International. They
could really get behind this AIDS thing and run with it." 94
Some audiences confront speakers without waiting for intermediaries
to interpret their views. We have seen feminists denounce
pornography, Jews and anti-racists oppose neo-Nazis, and Muslims
seek to silence Rushdie. The Province of St. Joseph of the Capuchin
Order in Milwaukee bought stock in media and tobacco companies
in order to attack cigarette advertising at shareholder meetings. It
forced Philip Morris to extend the mandatory American warnings to
cigarettes sold abroad. Gannett, which owns the largest American
billboard company and earned 15 per cent of its annual $1.5 billion
revenues from tobacco, insisted that cigarettes were "integral to the
success of outdoor advertising companies" and that "the company is
acting in a socially responsible manner . . . ." 95 Angered by a
Cuban-American television commentator who blamed Puerto Rican
poverty on the "thousands of single mothers, very young, who try to
escape . . . through welfare or through new partners who then
leave, and leave behind other children to worsen the problem,"
Puerto Rican groups in New Jersey persuaded advertisers to boycott
57