These are trying times. The economy is in a downturn, the war in Iraq lingers on, gas costs over $4 a gallon, and large businesses in America are losing money. At times like this, I think back to WWII and the efforts of the government and businesses to bolster the economy, how they encouraged thrift, recycling, reusing old materials, growing Victory gardens, tightening the belt a little. (Of course, the flip side to this was a series of posters villianizing Germans and Japanese.) I think of the heroic posters that helped shape graphic design as a profession and of the designers who created these posters. How good it must have felt to create something with meaning, value, that held up to some ethical standards rather that simply selling toothpaste and hair tonic.

I was talking to my class at PSU about ethical design and our responsibility as designers to do no harm in creating communications and experiences that others will experience. Ethics is a slippery topic, but I like to keep things as simple as possible: does what you are creating impact another human being in a negative way? Is it honest, or does it err on the side of a lie? Who benefits when the “target audience” acts on seeing you ad or using your website? At the end of the day, can you feel good about what you created on more than a visual appeal level?

These trying times are a little different than they were during WWII. In the face of rising fuel prices and a weaker US dollar, what do we do as a nation? We buy things. We consume. It’s what the government tells us to do. Patriotism is defined by consumerism, by large corporations’ profit margins and sales figures. But what does that have to do with ethics?

Check out Dodge’s latest campaign* to convince people to buy their vehicles. “Let’s Refuel America” is a shameless promotion promising $2.99/gallon gas for 3 years to folks who buy a Dodge vehicle. Sounds pretty good since gas in Portland is already at $4.23 in my part of town. And look at those bold, heroic red and yellow direct-marketing graphics. Gosh, finally some good news about how expensive gas is. The average Joe sure does deserve a break, and if he just buys a Dodge he could get that break. American companies stand for the American people!

The agency behind this promotion should be ashamed. The designers who worked on it should lose some sleep. They’re telling people to ignore the environment, to keep driving gas-guzzling cars, that it’s their right to suck up all the gas they want and only pay $2.99 for it. Don’t think about the future, don’t protect nature for your children, and base all your decisions on a price point.

What Dodge could be doing if they really wanted to “refuel America” is take on the oil lobby and advocate for alternative fuels. They could create more efficient cars instead of the laughable Durango Hybrid. They could educate people about how to conserve fuel and resources. They could subsidize public transportation to reduce reliance on individual vehicles. They could be a leader for the future, but instead they’re a scion of the past desperately clinging to increased sales of SUVs as the road to profits.

The designers who worked on this promotion should have just said no. Sounds scary, sounds hard, but that’s life. Stand for something, create change, do something good with your life. Because if this is all about money, we’re in real trouble.

* Thanks to Stephen Landau of Substance for sharing the link to this campaign and fueling my ethical outrage

Tagged as design, ethics, politics, respect, sustainability + Categorized as Ideas & Theories, Ideas & Theories, Saving the world, Ideas & Theories, Teaching & Learning