Years ago, I took a class with Milton Glaser at SVA, and he presented us with an article he had written for Metropolis magazine called, The Road to Hell. In it, he gives twelve examples—from mild to terrible of "truth bending" in graphic design. In these scenarios, design always involves deception, making it morally compromised by default. Therefore, it is a designer’s responsibility to decide the degree to which they are personally willing to sin.
As a young girl-boss with an unpaid internship who was desperate to break into the field, this rubbed me the wrong way. Glaser's late-career ethical conundrum about which client to choose felt like a luxury. I hadn’t earned that privilege yet. I needed a client…any client…and instead of teaching us marketable skills, he wasted valuable class time with what felt like Sunday school.
To be fair, I've always found the potential power and depravity of design deliciously appealing. An idea still popular in the early aughts—now waning—is that images have immense potential to persuade the public. Books like The Hidden Persuaders (1957) and Subliminal Seduction (1973) spelled out the cynical manipulation tactics employed by advertising media. These books flattered design, making it seem influential and dangerous! I imagined a future of meetings in board rooms, deviously plotting how to fool the public.
But lies, like the concentric circles of Hell, go deep. I never discovered the gleeful collusion I expected. Instead, I encountered something way more nefarious—the world of bullshit. Advertisers were believing their own lies or at least pretending to. (It's hard to tell because they never drop the act!) You have to drink the Kool-aid to even get in the room. Once you're there, everyone parrots ad-copy claptrap about cool pharmaceuticals, effective diet plans, and new shampoos that will change your life! Even the most well-intentioned designer, if gullible enough to believe and then propagate this nonsense, could conceivably be on the road to Hell and not even notice.
Perpetuating an atmosphere of bullshit at work (versus deceiving the public while maintaining an atmosphere of truthfulness behind the scenes) is likely a direct response to Glaser's ethical concerns. Suppose a sought-after designer like Glaser only chooses clients they deem ethical. It would, in that case, be in the interest of a dubious client to misrepresent themself to the designer. Thus, by taking up the mantle of moral "goodness," designers inadvertently make themselves a mark.
I'm not arguing that good intentions are futile, nor do I think designers should abandon ethics altogether. Instead, I'm pointing out that insisting on absolute moral purity perversely incentivizes obfuscation. As a result, the truth becomes harder to see, making acting ethically less straightforward. It also makes the consequences of unethical behavior more difficult to pin down and easier to justify.
Boudin Noir is fabulously delicious. They used to serve it at Florent back in the day. I love to eat it even though I know it is made from congealed blood—and now so do you. You can choose to ignore how gross that is. You can try to forget. You can know and pretend you don't know. You can know and not care. But even if you never found out, choosing to eat the sausage always has the same material outcome—you ate dried blood. It might be more pleasant not to know, but if you do and you still eat the sausage…at least you know what you're putting in your mouth.
Back when I was in Glaser's class, I imagined "selling out" as a Faustian bargain. In a single moment, the devil would show up and offer me untold riches if only I were willing to market cigarettes to kids. However, I never expected that many little devils (often in the guise of angels) would whisper empty promises and repeat boring platitudes that leave me wondering, "is this selling out?"
"You look like an angel, walk like an angel, talk like an angel, but I got wise. You're the devil in disguise." —Elvis Presley
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.