Taking transit makes me feel like a loser!

Whenever I take transit I feel like a loser. It’s not actually taking the bus or train that makes me feel like a deadbeat, but rather the advertising inside. Large companies go to great lengths and expense in the pursuit of market research, so I sense they must have done their homework when targeting transit riders like myself.

There are no ads thanking me for taking transit or hailing me an environmental hero. Instead, there are ads suggesting what pathetic little lives we transit users have. How else to explain when Money Mart and other payday loan sharks, the Credit Counseling Society, the Rental Assistance Program, and the Pardon Service are all advertising to such a captivated audience? There are ads for employment centres, and several ads for various career colleges. One school even has the slogan, swim with the new fish. How nice. What they really mean is that you have to take transit because you’re a flunkee and your only hope of redeeming your pitiful life is to take one of their courses.

I even noticed one ad today from the Centre of Disease Control, with a man staring out to the stinkin’ masses with a bar of soap in his hand, and the simple message, “start by using plain soap”. I noticed others on the train checking to see if they too applied deodorant.

Even the cell phones ads are geared to losers. Instead of showing off the latest features of the phones, the messaging is all about the lowest rates. They might as well say, “Yes, even smelly you, with bad credit, no job, a lousy education, and a criminal record can still have a cell phone at low rates.”

As the train rolled into my stop, I looked up and saw one ad that asked, “Need an Education Plan.” Maybe what it should have said is “Need a Life Plan?”