Wednesday, April 7, 2021

"The MuthaF**kin Manifesto."

I don't spend a lot of time on Twitter. To be completely candid, I refuse to like anything that propelled donald trump to the presidency. But I was on Twitter yesterday, and saw something from Derek Walker that intrigued me.




I don't know what "The MuthaFuckin Manifesto" is. I don't know what those words mean. But still, I figured who better to write "The MuthaFuckin Manifesto" than I.


The MuthaFucker Manifesto.

Many years ago, when I was at Ogilvy for my first stint, Jerry Seinfeld entertained at the Christmas party. He said something like "the best thing about advertising is that you can break it down into two words. Something is either good or it sucks."

"How was working with Frank?"
"Oh it sucked."

"Did you see that new Pepsi spot?"
"Yeah, it was good."

"Phyllis got fired."
"That sucks."

That above is about the sum total of all the conversations ever had in an agency on any given day. 

There's not a lot of grey area in the ad business.

The same is true when it comes to people.

There are two sorts.

First, there are the MuthaFuckers.

I'll start with them. Because this is, after all, The MuthaFucker Manifesto.

MuthaFuckers use the word "I." They say "I did that." They don't share credit.

MuthaFuckers talk more--a lot more--than they listen. They mask their insecurities with a cloak of pomposity and arrogance as thick as the polar ice cap.

MuthaFuckers are always right. No one else's opinion matters.

MuthaFuckers lie. They say things like "no one got a bonus this year." Though you know certain people did. And "there isn't any money for raises." But there always is when someone threatens to leave.

MuthaFuckers are closed off to any idea that isn't their own. Unless they can take the credit for it.

MuthaFuckers are always broadcasting how hard they work, how late they stayed and the pressure only they are under.

MuthaFuckers don't like humor unless they're the ones telling the joke.

In keeping with Jerry Seinfeld's dialectic, there's the opposite of MuthaFuckers. 

They're called Mensches.

They usually show up on time, say please and thank you, bust their ass, save yours and just want to go home at night and read to their kids, kiss their spouse, hang with a friend or watch the last few innings of some sort of ballgame.

They usually get the assignments no one else can do.

Mensches often have sharp pencils because they untie knots that are very tightly tied.

They're the people who have the shoulders everyone cries on. Typically because of something the MuthaFucker did.

When there's a big pitch, Mensches are usually in the back of the room typing while everyone else is fighting about the deck's page order or some arcane word-choice in a brand promise.

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I don't know what it is about the ad industry today, but the MuthaFuckers seem to outnumber the Mensches. Maybe it was always that way. Maybe it will always be. And maybe there's nothing anyone can do about it.

That's the MuthaFucking shitty thing about it all.

MuthaFuckers.





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