While back on twitter, podcaster Ellie Schnitt declared with the passion of a 1000 pronouns:
“my favorite right wing thing is when they say nyc is sooooo scawwwyy like not to be that girl but I am the approximate size and strength of a ladybug and I don’t feel unsafe here so it’s objectively funny to be a Big Tough Country Boy and shit your diaper over the subway”
To which my reply was:
“My favorite NYC story is when @stefaniasettle saw a bum across the street of her mom’s Manhattan resell store jerking off in public, and the cops formed a protective ring around him while he did it. I like the way they do bid’niz”
Which then got some replies like:
“ok, how do you unsee a tweet?”
“My poor eye holes.”
“How can I unread this!”
Fun times on Twitter.
And yes, there is a point to this beyond my grossing you out. And that point is, creating Vision doesn’t require showing any pictures, images, or videos. If you know what you’re doing, your words fueling your reader’s imagination is a far more useful way to use an image to make sales than a gif or emoji, meme, or other picture.
Been getting low on hate mail, so let’s take for example everyone’s favorite subject:
Abortion.
Ooh!
Many years ago I remember seeing a bunch of pro-life protestors lining up along the road during morning rush hour holding up graphic pictures of aborted babies. Very disturbing and graphic, and horrifying. I remember feeling sick to my stomach. I suspect most everyone else who saw them did too. But, I also seriously doubt anyone’s opinion on the matter was swayed either way. Those against it were still against it (while feeling sick and probably angry at the protestors) and those who are okay with it were still okay with it (while feeling sick and also probably angry at the protestors).
What’d work better?
I’d argue what’d work a lot better is talking to people using just their words to create a Vision. Like, for example, when Antony Levatino testified at a House Judiciary Committee hearing about Planned Parenthood’s medical procedures after having personally performed over 1200 abortions himself.
You can read the transcript or watch it on YouTube.
But some of the highlights included such Vision as:
“Your patient today is 17 years old; she’s 22 weeks pregnant. Her baby is the length of your hand plus a couple of inches, and she’s been feeling her baby kick for the last several weeks. And she’s asleep on an operating room table.”
“…you introduce a suction catheter into the uterus. This is a 14 French suction catheter. If she were 12 weeks pregnant or less, basically the width of your hand or smaller, you could basically do the entire procedure with this, but babies this big don’t fit through catheters this size.”
“…you introduce an instrument called the Sopher clamp. It’s about 13 inches long. It’s made of stainless steel. The business end of this clamp is about 2 1/2 inches long and a half-inch wide. There are rows of sharp teeth. This is a grasping instrument, and when it gets a hold of something, it does not let go.”
“…and out pops a leg about that big, which you put down on the table next to you. Reach in again, pull again, pull out an arm about the same length, which you put down on the table next to you. And use this instrument again and again to tear out the spine, the intestines, the heart, and lungs. The head on a baby that size is about the size of a large plum.”
“…You know you did it right if you crush down on the instrument and white material runs out of the cervix. That was the baby’s brains. Then you can pull out skull pieces. And if you have a day like I had a lot of times, sometimes a little face comes back and stares back at you.”
“Congratulations. You’ve just successfully performed a second-trimester D&E abortion. You just affirmed your right to choose.”
The little face staring back is quite the eerie Vision.
And I suspect many-a-person reading it no doubt has a Vision from that now seared into their own non-liquified white goo brains they will not soon forget. Plus, there is nothing to “object” to as far as arguing with it, because, like any persuasion and influence based in Vision it makes no argument to object to.
It simply is what it is.
And while most will not have had their minds changed immediately, the experience of reading that won’t be easily forgotten. Possibly it might even change someone’s opinion in the future over time, as it takes hold, they think about it, see it in a new context, it fits into their world when it didn’t prior to reading it, and have time to digest it all. It’s happened before to some of my customers when I’ve talked about this subject using Vision — especially in my old elBenbo’s Lair Facebook group.
And should that happen to someone?
It won’t be because of any pictures since I didn’t show any.
Nor will it be from any slick “sales copy” or appeals to reason or logic or religion.
It will be because of Vision.
Their Vision, not mine, from their imagination, not mine, based on their experience, not mine – or any vision I try to impose on them with a photo, picture, gif, or anything else I could include in this email.
Speaking of email…
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Ben Settle
