I work from home on a permanent basis-- but once in awhile I need to go to the office for some meeting or another. To me, the most striking thing about my employer's office complex is how it has inward-facing propaganda-- this, in contrast to outward-facing propaganda, such as advertising. I wonder how common this is with large corporations?

I've written before about how the walls have creepy, pseudo-subliminal messaging on them, like "we care about our employees". But after not having been in for some months, the gyno-centricity was what stood out to me the most.

The first thing I saw when I arrived was a blood bank van parked outside the employee entrance. Not only was it painted bright pink, but it had "This vehicle contains HOPE" printed in giant boldface. The next thing I noticed was that the company had put large cardboard stand-ups, with the silhouette of a woman running, "advertising" the "corporate strategy du jour" to its own employees. Everywhere I turned, I saw one of these-- there must be two or three dozen of them on the campus.

Of course, I picked up on the fact very early in my career that these trendy "buzzword bingo" corporate strategies come and go about every six months, and that it is absolutely pointless to even bother remembering what they are-- so I haven't a clue what a running woman has to do with anything.

But rather, the point I'm illustrating is how the messaging I get bombarded with in my rare workplace forays is carefully crafted to manipulate people's emotions, versus using fact and logic. And seeing as how I'm almost totally impervious to emotional ploys, I pick up on the objective facts of the manipulations, like which kinds of fonts or colors are used, how things are arranged, and so forth.