Spitting on the table

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZ3B8WvVjL4&feature=player_embedded] I wanted to write about this video not because it's any good, and certainly not because I agree with anything in it. I find it offensive and racist and sexist. I wanted to post about it only because it's a classic example of what I call spitting on the table. What's spitting on the table you may ask? It's an example I always use to show the difference between getting attention and getting the right kind of attention.

See it's easy to get attention. If we were meeting, and I stand up on and spit on the table, you'll remember me, I'll get your attention, and you may even talk to your spouse or friends about me after the meeting.  Of course, you'll probably tell them about the crazy guy who spit on the table.

It's one thing to get attention, it's another thing to get attention for what you want to be remembered for -- to be on-emotion and on-message. This video may be vaguely on message, but it's so misses the mark on-emotion (offensive and in your face) that I doubt it would be effective at all. In fact the campaign that it's supporting has come out against it as well.

I'm sure the group running this mess thought it was brilliant, that it everyone was going to be writing about it, that it was going to crush their opponent. They'll have to be satisfied with one of out three..., like I said it's easy to get attention, but what you do with it when folks are watching, well therein lies the rub.