Groundswell Book Review: Part I

I was surfing the Web today and checking out some of my favorite blogs.  I happened upon Deirdre Breakenridge’s blog and saw that she had started reading Groundswell.  I couldn’t believe it!  All throughout this course (Public Relations and Social Media) we have been reading that book, and I have used it in a number of papers and blog posts.

Anyways I saw that Breakenridge was also writing a book review of Groundswell and thought that many of you (my readers) would find it very interesting since Breakenridge is the author of PR 2.0 New Media, New Tools, New Audiences, which I did my Trade Book Review on.

Breakenridge is an accomplished, inventive and smart woman and you should be sure to check out her other books listed here on her site.

Be sure to read Breakenridge’s review of Groundswell Book Review: Part I.

Be My Guest Ashley London

For the second week in a row my topic of the week will be posted by a guest blogger of my choosing.  This week I chose to post something from fellow class member, Ashley London’s blog.  Ashley is also a student in Barbara Nixon’s Social Media for PR class, and she has done a series of posts filed under the category of “PR Connections” about “The Big Shockers in Advertising”.  I found each of these posts interesting and sometimes hard to swallow.

The following post is directly from Ashley’s blog.  After reading this one, I suggest you go to Ashley’s blog and read the other posts in the series. Enjoy!

The Big Shockers in Advertising: Part #4 by: Ashley London

PETA (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) is a company that stands for the “rights” of animals around the world. Their main focuses include animals in factory farms, laboratories, in the clothing trade and also in the entertainment industry. Recently the have started a new campaign to push people to become vegetarians.

The name of the campaign is the “Save the Whales” campaign. This campaign has nothing to do with actually saving a whale. The whale in this case is referring to people, more specifically overweight people. Their underlying slogan to the campaign is “Lose the Blubber. Go vegetarian.” There has been a big stir in the media about this campaign, numerous amounts of people are taking this ad to be offensive.

I think that there is a reason for people to cause an uproar about the campaign because it is really a very unethical campaign. The funny thing is the PETA’s name states that they stand for ethics and even though it is for animals, I feel it should be respected for everyone. But aren’t humans animals too in a sense?

When asked about the new campaign and its controversy a spokesperson from the campaign states that they feel that animals don’t understand what is being done to them and they need someone to speak for them while on the other hand humans are able to defend themselves and can understand. They feel that this ad is not to be taking offensively but if it is then people can do something about it. My question for PETA is if you are going to offend humans on earth and then you upset them….who will be with you to save the animals?

You can contact Ashley London at her blog or on Twitter.