Classic Key: The Most Memorable from the Great Subliminal Scare

For  Jack, just because the subliminal flashes of the Exorcist was a big part of the author's first book... 

From the mid-1970s through 1992, the late Professor Wilson Bryan Key, Ph.D, wrote a handful of books about subliminal advertising in the United States:

• Subliminal Seduction (1974)
• Media Sexploitation (1977)
• The Clam-Plate Orgy (1980)
• The Age of Manipulation: The Con in Confidence, The Sin in Sincere (1992)
• Subliminal Ad-Ventures in Erotic Art (1992)

The first and second tomes were so popular, they became part of American culture and touched off Congressional investigations. In the mid 1980s, while I was freshmen at Baldwin Senior High School, Key's theories were taught as fact, just as they were at colleges and universities across the country. The premise was simple: Madison Avenue, in their blind allegiance to the bottom line, were raping your subconscious mind with an airbrush, titillating your latent homosexuality, and playing off the suicidal tendencies of alcoholics. With each tome, this purported MENSA-level genius ratcheted up the hyperbole. What started out as deliberately placed "SEX embeds" in the ice cubes of print ads became the word FUCK etched into front page photos on the New York Times; drag queens gracing the cover of Playboy; Nabisco baking the word SEX into Ritz Crackers; HOJO's fried clams taking human form in a twisted orgy, and the Treasury Department hiding the word SEX hidden in Abraham Lincoln's beard on the (old style) $5 bill.

With more and more skeptics beginning to seriously question Key's theories and evidence, he stuck to his guns, even testifying as an expert witness for the plaintiffs in the early 1990s Judas Priest suicides lawsuit. Here's some of the author's most memorable bits that first come to mind. I honestly don't recall the ulterior motives Key ascribed to each specific piece of evidence he served up, but most (if not all) of it as been debunked.

The following photos are clickable, and do give the viewer a better idea of what Key was seeing / claiming to see. If you can relax while focusing on the ads, you will see many of the same things. But in most cases, lighting, angles, shadows and other factors are a much better explanation than most of Key's theories. Yes, there was a phantom's face that flashed several times throughout The Exorcist, but it was hardly subliminal. And no, Simon and Garfunkel's Grammy award winning song "Bridge over Troubled Water" is not about a heroin addict, drug dealer, and syringe. 

That was the first bit of photographic proof from the original book. I'm not gonna deny there's something that looks like an "S" in the ice cube adjacent to the lime, and I do see an E and a muddled X in the following 2 rocks. But you could put the winning powerball numbers in that ad, and it still ain't gonna make run out and buy Gibley's (or any other brand of Gin for that matter).

Ingenious if (and that's a big "if") it's true. The model posing as the losing fighter in the rink has had a little airbrushing on his glove. As any kid who grew up on Long Island could've told you, Cooper gloves were the end all and be all in hockey equipment, but on Key's closer inspection, the brand name's"OO" was modified to 'AN' and the "P" was made a "C". Whattya got? Cancer getting an all deserved beat down and giving B and H smokers peace of mind when they lit up.




This was always my favorite. Rats, sharks, wolves, crows, snakes, and other symbols of death hidden in the ice cubes over an orgasmic volcano in a rocks glass of Calvert Scotch. I don't recall the exact number of creatures Key claimed to have found, but the basic premise was the ad helped validate the self-destructive nature of the alcoholic -- and that most everyone who drinks spirits can identify their preferred brand...but ca not even taste the difference between different varieties of alcohol (i.e. scotch vs. rye or vodka vs. gin).

I always liked this one (from the 2nd or 3rd book, if memory serves. The only problem is, the "face" in the surf is 'blowing' as opposed to licking....and quite frankly, I haven't come across too many people who like their crotches blown on, unless it's really hot out .

Ah yes, the infamous SEXes baked into their Ritz Crackers. They're the same exact cracker showing the head and tails side of , with the lower two sides howing where the SEXes were put into the baking mold. As Andy Griffith used to say, "Mmmmm, good cracker".

This Howard Johnson's menu photo was the namesake for for the 3rd book. According to Key, he and about 3 of his 4 students who were having lunch their one day all ordered the clams. As their was lunch was served they wondered aloud why they had ordered it, as none professed a craving for frozen / deep fried shellfish. On further inspection of the menu, their 'trained eyes' detected naked human forms...not breaded clam strips. >> Insert eye-roll here <<    

 You might not have known it. but the Treasury was etching the word SEX into Lincoln's beard. You can kinda make it out on zoom: The S and E on opposite sides of the crease, on the vertical fold. I'll admit, I can make it out, but facial and head hair can often make unintended shapes like clouds . Key's conspiratorial purpose focused on the Treasury Department's need for consumerism, but it was a fairly bizarre theory.