Sunday, November 20, 2016

Colourific Value

Manchester United, Communism, Ferrari, Coca Cola, McDonald’s… What’s the connection? Yes… you got it. It’s the colour red. Research has proved that the sight of colour red incites hunger and thirst. McDonald’s, Coca Cola, Red Bull are testimony to this fact. Red also signifies victory. It is no surprise that the top 3 teams in the English Premier League have red in their insignias – Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal.

Colours are all around us. One cannot deny the impact of colours in our lives. You wake up and brush your teeth… the toothpaste is white if it is dental cream, red, green or blue in case of gel. Your morning tea/ coffee is brown or black depending on your milk preference. Oh! If you happen to be a teetotaler, white milk is your drink. Breakfast time and the butter and cheese you eat is yellow. So even before you step out of your home for work or college, you end up seeing close to eight colours.
One emotion can have different colours in different parts of the world. Mourning for example in the UK is black, in India it is white while in Brazil it’s purple. Whoa!! An international marketing manager better be aware of these facts!! Red is for stop/ danger while green it is green for go.
The different shades help us bind together as a group – Black for all the pseudo-Satan worshippers and death metalers around the globe, Red scarves and jerseys Manchester United fans, Blue for all the Team India, Green for all the surreal capitalists. These clusters have people of different race, class and sex. You’ll find a Caucasian Eminem rapping about the Ghetto with his African-American counterparts, Indian Metal bands with names like Demonic Resurrection and an African endorsing Yoga!!

However, colours segment people right from the time they come out of the mother’s womb. A girl gets a pink towel and the boy gets a blue. People are white, black, brown and yellow. You have white collar jobs and you have blue collar jobs. Isn’t that a paradox?!  So are colours binding us or fragmenting us? Well… I don’t know. In case you figure out, do let me know. Google, in my opinion, is a smart operator considering the colours of the six alphabets in its names keep changing!!

The colour I see as green… Is it really green? Maybe I was taught by a colour blind teacher in kindergarten who couldn’t differentiate between green and blue. Have I all my life known blue as green? Team India’s fatigues are green? The vast oceans are green? The sky is green? I really hope that’s not the case. I pray that my perception of green is same as the rest of the world.


Before I conclude, I will leave you with some food for thought. Are black and white shades of grey?