Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Consumerist has an incredible article about the ten most ironic advertisements in history and they are absolutely astonishing. How about an ad from Union Carbide declaring, "Science helps build a new India"? Or an ad with the slogan, "When life depends on it, you use asbestos." Or an ad from Dutch Boy lead paint: "Where your dream house comes true, don't let cheap paint make it a nightmare!"
Perhaps best of all is this public service announcement. Yes, it's James Dean encouraging kids to drive safely:
Comments
Thanks. That really tickled my T-zone.
Posted by: Grumpy | July 19, 2009 11:13 AM
My personal favourite was an old diet aids that was called Ayds. Commercials for the product said things like "Why take diet pills when you can enjoy Ayds?" When AIDS came along, they tried changing the name to Diet Ayds but eventually just pulled it off the market.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayds
Posted by: Romeo Vitelli | July 19, 2009 11:53 AM
Commercials for the product said things like "Why take diet pills when you can enjoy Ayds?"
I remember those ads!
Yeah, full-blown AIDS will make you lose weight too...but not in a good way.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 19, 2009 1:25 PM
Why did they scuttle the Dean PSA? IMHO, the fact that he died speeding in a car crash would have lent more weight to its credibility, not to mention pathos.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 19, 2009 1:27 PM
ah yes the irony...besides the obvious irony of having James Dean telling kids to drive safely to save lives, it's also a bit amusing to see him smoking a cigarette while doing so.
Posted by: neokortex | July 19, 2009 1:34 PM
Adrienne: Because it would have been a too obvious case of do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do. He ignored his own advice and drove with excessive speed on the highway.
Posted by: Eric Lund | July 19, 2009 3:02 PM
The evidence is unclear as to whether Dean was speeding. What is clear is that the other driver, perhaps blinded by the sun, made a left turn in front of Dean and was the cause of the accident.
Posted by: Jay Pedelty | July 19, 2009 3:57 PM
There's a story (which I suspect is apocryphal) of an outdoorsman's cap that featured a large bill and an extra-strong elastic headband. It was called the Hemingway cap, and an advertisement came out proclaiming that because of its elastic band it was "guaranteed not to blow off your head." Supposedly the ad appeared just before Hemingway took a gun and blew off his head.
Posted by: Eveningsun | July 19, 2009 4:21 PM
Wow. I've never noticed how much Brad Pitt resembles him. Thelma and Louise Brad Pitt, in particular.
Posted by: Andrea | July 19, 2009 5:15 PM
Eric Lund @6:
Adrienne: Because it would have been a too obvious case of do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do. He ignored his own advice and drove with excessive speed on the highway.
Yes, but he certainly paid the ultimate price for not taking his own advice, didn't he? It's not as though he happily kept on speeding in his car unscathed.
I mean, what better demonstration of cause and effect could you ask for?
Posted by: Adrienne | July 20, 2009 9:44 AM
A more recent one, was after 911 there were a number of patriotic themed public service ads to 'feel good' about America.
One ad showed a person in a library in an unnamed country asking for a book. On his way out of the library, he is accosted by government agents. Apparently at the time, the producer of that ad did not know that the Patriot act had just authorized that form of government behavior here in good ole USA.
Comment on some of the other ads, I don't doubt that the cellophane ad was somewhat tongue in cheek, though today they'll need ao 'do not attemp' disclaimer (sheesh)
The Pinto story is a bit of a case history about urban stories becoming fact. The truth was far more complex than is popularly understood, and for that matter other popular vehicles actually had a worse fire accident rate. But like news stories vary depending on the mood of the nation when they hit, one of the tragic crashes just happened to hit at a time where the national mood was receptive to the little guy vs evil corporation story.
Posted by: jay | July 20, 2009 12:47 PM