I love the new VISA commercials. You know, the ones which have customers moving quickly and uniformly through stores and shopping lines. Swipe, done. Swipe, done. What messes up this process and happiness….CASH. Cold hard cash. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, take a gander at one of the spots:
You know who would love this commercial? Pre-WWII Germans.
Seriously though, am I supposed to look at this commercial, nod my head, look over at my wife as she reads the latest Oprah Magazine, and say, “Honey..check out this commercial..thatis SO TRUE…I can’t tell you how many times people with EXACT CHANGE or HARD CURRENCY have held me up at the coffee shop.”
Am I right people? What’s with all these idiots paying cash for their transactions. I mean, COME ONE…you’re holding up the line! If you want to really make a difference, and be part of the crowd and get in line with the greatest consumer mob the world has ever seen, be like everyone else, take out your wallet, fumble around and select which one of your ten cards you want to use, swipe it, then swipe it back up ’cause the liquor store’s VISA machine doesn’t work properly, and then swipe back down, and then give the clerk a puzzling, “What’s the deal with your credit card machine” look, and then swipe again. Then….quickly wait untilthe cashier presses the button, unless, at this point he accidentally deletes the transaction, and then politely asks you to swipe your card again. At this point in the FASTEST WAY TO PAY, the machine asks you to select credit or debit, in which you weigh both options and try to remember your bank’s fees and restrictions in regards to credit or debit card purchases. As you mentally plan on how you’re going to spend all this free time you’ve just saved by using VISA while waiting for the store’s printer to spit out your two receipts without jamming or running out of ink, or freezing up — or, at worst, making your clerk call the VISA hotline to troubleshoot issues with the card reader and/or printer.
As you wink to the customer behind you letting them know that you know that they know that you’re part of the “VISA” club, the machine prompts you to input your pin number, in which you can’t remember whether it’s your youngest son’s birthday coupled with your anniversary, or the four digit date of your High School Football City Championship game, in which you scored the touchdown that put you within fourteen points of Walter Mondale High that cool night in late November in 1989. Regardless, just keep coolin the fact that LIFE TAKES VISA, and a multi-billion dollar corporation is tracking your every purchase, cross referencing it with your previous buying habits, and then perhaps selling your name, information, likes, dislikes, and purchase history since you were eighteen to governments, companies, or marketing firms in violation of your privacy agreement.
Yeah..you’re awesome. You reek of success. If you reek too much, this same company will not complain or help you stop your bank, store, or credit card company from jacking your rate from 8% to 22%, even you haven’t missed a payment.
But you have time to worry about all that later, because right you now, you and your team, THE AMERICAN PUBLIC, are cool enough to get away with forgetting the half-gallon of milk you were supposed to get, meaning you have to start the transaction again from the beginning, and pray that the previous transaction hasn’t already gone through, in which you’ll be double-billed on your next statement.
But yeah…Cash! Fuck Cash! Cash is for suckers. Cash is what old people use. Cash is what drug lordsstuff in briefcases. Use cash…the terrorists win!!
LIFE TAKES VISA!!
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