Were You Duped by the Gillette Ad?

Were you, like myself and thousands of others, duped by the Gillette ad?

How do you know if you were duped?

You took sides.

And if you took sides, and defended the ad, I’m guessing you are liberal leaning. And if you hated the ad, you’re probably conservative leaning.

Here is the problem with that: Does a liberal’s definition of a good man and a conservative’s definition of a good man differ a whole lot? I’m guessing not. If you asked a conservative to write a list of ten things describing what a good man is, and asked a liberal to do likewise, I’m pretty sure those lists would be nearly exact.

Then why did the Gillette ad cause so much division?

Because it was designed to.

If Gillette truly cared about encouraging men to act as good men, could they not have created an ad which would offend no one and create no division? Of course they could. It’s not hard. Simply portray a variety of men acting in a variety of good ways in a variety of situations: A man holding a door open for a woman; a man defending someone against bullying; a man working with inner city kids; etc…. Create an ad like that, but do not infuse into it any accusatory or preachy tone. That ad would encourage men to act well and it would offend no one.

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Gillette does not care about men behaving well. Like an arms dealer making millions selling weapons to both sides of a war, Gillette is playing the culture war hoping to increase its profits. If, in ten years, Gillette believes it can increase profits by appealing to conservative men, you can be sure it will create the appropriate ads to do that. With this latest ad, Gillette seems to be targeting progressive liberals.

So lets all agree that there are both good men and bad men out there, on both the left and the right, and that most men are trying to be good men. And also, lets all agree that a multi-billion dollar corporation, like Gillette, is not the best place to look to for our moral standards.

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PS… Why are men buying Gillette razors anyway? They’re a rip off! Go and get yourself a Merkur safety razor, along with a box of a hundred blades, and you’re set for decades.

The Blind

Most leadership teaching is common sense made to sound profound through lofty platitudes.

At least that’s what I think.

Am I wrong?

The next time you hear a leadership message, write down all the lessons taught in that message, the basic lessons, and dismiss the window dressing. Then, look at your list and ask: Is there anything here I didn’t already know by the time I was twelve years old?

I’m guessing your answer will be no.

I could be wrong.

Where do You Fit?

fit in “So there’s this terrible tension in organizations, and I think what generally happens is all the creative people are there at the beginning. They get chased out until you have nothing but managers and administrators. Then the environment shifts, then the company dies.”

I’ve written some articles (see list below) about how a movement, at its beginning, will be run by visionaries and see rapid growth. But, once that growth tapers off, a new kind of leader needs to take control, one who knows how to manage the resources gained in the rapid growth phase. But, as Jordan Peterson talks about in the video below, you don’t want to get rid of the visionaries altogether. New creative ideas will always be needed in order for the organization to survive.

Do you know where you fit in?

Related reading…

Leaders of Movements

Men of Words

Visionary Leaders Vs Masters

Passive Aggressive Poison

passive aggressive ninja “I don’t worry, if they have a problem with me, they will preach about me!”

That’s what a friend told me when describing the leadership at a bible college he was attending. He had discovered that when and if the leadership was unhappy with what he was doing, rather than confronting him directly, they would come at him indirectly through passive aggressive tactics. And a great way to destroy relationships is to act passive aggressively.

What is passive aggressiveness? It is simply an avoidance of direct confrontation due to cowardliness. If passive aggressiveness takes root in your group it becomes a poison killing the tree. You have to deal with it quickly.

I’ve been guilty of this behaviour myself in the past, but I’ve made a rule to avoid it. It takes time to recognize it in yourself, but gets easier to stop over time.

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Forging a Simple Leaf Hook

Here is a way to forge a leaf hook. These are quite popular, and can be made quickly with some practice.

I start with some 3/8″ round bar cut to 9″.

After heating up the bar, make a small square taper at one end of the bar. This will be the tip of the leaf. After that, isolate about 3/4″ from the tip of the taper back by hammering two fullers on the corner of your anvil 90˚ from each other.

Draw out the bar for about 2″ from the fullers back. You can clean this up later. Next, to make the leaf shape, with the corner of the isolated bulb pointing up, hammer the piece down flat. Use the peen of your hammer to widen the leaf where needed.

Next, chisel in on the leaf the veins. I like to use a chisel with a rounded edge so that I can walk the chisel along as I hit.

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Now place the piece back in the fire the other way around to start the hook. Forge a square taper on the end and draw out the bar so that a smooth even taper is made from the end to about 4″ in length. Next, round out the taper by forging out the corners — square to octagon — octagon to round.

Next, forge a “curly-Q” at the end of the taper.

Now you’re ready to bend the hook. You can do this around the horn of the anvil, but if you are making several hooks and you want them to be the same, it is good to use a jig with a bending fork.

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Next, I like to flatten a couple of points to allow for screw holes. I drill the holes, but not before countersinking them at the anvil. I flatten out the sections using a guillotine tool with a flat die.

Now you can draw out and cleanup the stem between the leaf and the holes. Make the stem as skinny as you like, but make sure you will be able to bend it.

Using scrolling tongs, twist and turn the stem as you see fit. Also, using a v-block and a small cross peen hammer, create some folds in the leaf to make it more realistic looking.

Heat up the whole hook again and place into a vice. Use some tongs or pliers to straighten up the hook and make any changes you want. Then, give the whole thing a good wire brushing to remove scale. Now is a good time to file away any rough spots you don’t want.

While it is still hot, apply some kind of finish. I use a beeswax and coconut oil mixture.

Let it cool, wipe off the excess wax, and drill your holes. And it is done. I like to brush the leaf with a brass brush to give it a golden look.

Happy forging!

Related reading: Forging a Wall Hook Rack