The Cave #8

It’s Friday, we’re just a few days away from a public holiday bonanza, the sun is still out (and still warm), and Madonna has buried the hatchet with Elton John.  

So naturally we’re discussing chaos, death, and whether there’s any hope for compassion in election campaigns. 

XOXO, Gloomy Girl.

Comms

Communicating in chaos

Are we all feeling nice and liberated?US defends tariffs on uninhabited Australian islands populated by penguins and seals

Trump’s Liberation Day seems to have only succeeded in unshackling chaos, with tariffs that may as well have been calculated by the penguins on McDonald Island hitting economies around the world.

The consensus of many economists and commentators appears to be that while the tariffs are self-defeating and damaging, it is the uncertainty of their ideation, application, and possible adaptation that is the real threat.  

While neither people nor markets are entirely rational, both rely heavily on pattern recognition. The future may be impossible to predict, but we can identify probable outcomes based on what we’ve seen before and know to be true.

Trump upends that foundational principle. Tariffs on everyone but China are now paused, but there’s no reason to think a phone call couldn’t still lead to a country having tariffs removed, or doubled, or multiplied by a number pulled from a raffle drum.

When what comes next is untethered from what we’ve seen before, caution and indecision take hold. And for communicators looking to drive action, that can spell disaster. 

The last time brands faced a similar environment of uncertainty (Covid, obviously), everyone coalesced around the ‘we’re with you through tough times’ refrain (and lots of sombre piano riffs). This time, it isn’t so easy - the problem isn’t an indiscriminate virus, but a divisive, powerful, and vindictive individual.

Brands will probably avoid a political stance, but will inevitably respond to broader cultural vibes. We’ll likely see examples of empathy (‘we really understand things are uncertain’), transparency (‘we don’t know what tomorrow will bring, but we’ll get there together’) and security (‘assurance in unstable times’). 

But the key may lie in reminding people of the patterns they can still recognise, creating crutches of certainty upon which to take action. Think family, community, comedy, and a dash of nostalgia. 

Or we could just find an uninhabited island they haven’t thought of and trade from there.

Culture

The end of death

There is, of course, one thing we can all be grimly certain of - death.

Or so we thought.

This week, Colossal Biosciences announced they had brought back the long-extinct dire wolf by combining fossilised DNA with a gray wolf genome. 

In Australia, a team of artists and scientists have reprogrammed cells from acclaimed composer Alvin Lucier to mimic the human brain and create new musical scores, more than three years after his death.

The idea of immortality of some sort is, of course, a common cultural trope. It’s hard not to think of Jurassic Park when considering Colossal Biosciences’ goal to revive the woolly mammoth, while Futurama featured long preserved brains (and heads) of everyone from Abraham Lincoln to the members of Hanson.

Culture has also shown the danger and sadness of such pursuits. 

News that the UK government is developing a “murder prediction” program sounds a little too much like the plot of Minority Report, albeit with AI in place of clairvoyance (and a disappointing lack of Tilda Swinton). 

Meanwhile, Biohacker Bryan Johnson’s vision of a uniting crusade against the “enemy” of death in an FT interview appears to ignore the many, many cautionary tales from literature, film, and art.

At a time of terrifying and seemingly-implacable division, a common cause, driven by curiosity, offers hope. But we may also do well to heed the warnings found in all manner of cultural outputs across human existence.

Saying that, the baby dire wolves are pretty cute.

(Campaign) Curiosities 

A callow call for compassion

OK. Week two (hundred). It seemed like a good idea to do this section at the time.

We’re not naive enough to think compassion has much of a place in an election campaign. In Australia and around the world, those days are long gone, if they ever existed in the first place. But there’s no doubt that the temperature is rising on #AusVotes25.

Battleground electorates are living up to their billing, as signage is defaced with nuanced and well-informed terms like “communist” and “fascist”. It makes Monique Ryan’s husband removing a campaign sign look positively pacifist in comparison.

On a national level, Labor has settled into a rich seam of personal attacks on opposition leader, Peter Dutton. This was evident in the first Leaders’ Debate, held in Sydney this week, where the Prime Minister responded to tough realities on cost of living by attempting to discredit the messenger.

It may be effective, but as The Australian’s Dennis Shanahan points out, there is a fine line to walk before voters begin to tune out and turn off.

All is not lost on the humanity front, however. The news that Peter Dutton’s father suffered a heart attack shortly before the debate brought genuine concern from all sides of politics and the media. 

The fact that an agreement was made between the two leaders that the issue not be mentioned during the People’s Forum comes as no surprise.

More of this would go a long way.