John Olson: World still needs American ideas

Only a handful of Americans were invited to speak at an international advertising conference in Singapore, and I was pleased to be among them. I had never been to Asia, and flying business class sure beats working your way across on a steamer.

Lying supine watching first-run movies while sarong-clad flight attendants drive dim sum carts is part of the attraction. The other is the curious sensation you get at these new international conferences. It's a little like stumbling across a party that strangers are throwing in your own house. You're not unwelcome; you're just not completely necessary.

This is our house, after all: advertising. It's no less a great 20th-century American invention than jazz or Mickey Mouse or "Baywatch." The big ideas and economics are still largely driven by the West, but not for long; much is already being made in China and elsewhere.

One delegate from Beijing told me he found traveling the world disappointing these days; local keepsakes always end up having come from China anyway. "Even if it says 'Italy' on it? It's made in China," he told me. "I can just stay home."

My memento of the visit was an incident that happened late in a main address by an English ad executive. A woman next to me -- Thai, but an experienced Singapore hand -- was complaining in an agitated stage whisper throughout the presentation.

"Why aren't you saying something? This is all hypocrisy," she told me. "You should say something."

Her complaint was that the conference was dominated by a Western notion: that daring ideas are what matter. We were lecturing a populace living in enforced conformity about the virtues of thinking outside the box.

I flashed back to that morning's local newspaper, in which an official explained why expressing an opinion in public is still too dangerous to be allowed. Decades after the British colonials clinked their last Singapore Slings at the Long Bar of the Raffles Hotel, you still can't stand up at the Speakers Corner and say something controversial -- not if you want to be home for dinner, anyway.

But there we were, celebrating brashness, audacity and originality. Like Miles Davis, who, asked how long a song should be, answered, "As long as it takes." Or Steve Jobs, who won't stand for buttons on his devices or shirts. Or John Travolta's Chili Palmer from the movie "Get Shorty," who, asked who he is, answers, "I'm the guy who's telling you the way it is."

But our way is not the way it is in Singapore -- and throughout Asia, as my newfound conscience was telling me on the path to the next session. And she wanted me to stand up and point out the absurdity of things, something she couldn't do.

At this moment I reflected on the native practice of caning, which partly accounts for streets free from both crime and improperly disposed-of gum. (Speaking of provocative Western ideas, caning was introduced by British colonialists.)

Former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew spoke at the conference, taking deserved credit for bringing this beautiful and atmospheric island from the brink of chaos to peace and prosperity. He touted the 600 financial institutions that tower over the island. I remembered the "Fountain of Wealth" by our hotel and the Chinese salutation, "Congratulations and be prosperous."

Success is one value we surely share with the East, but we can't forget: It's not our greatest value. We cherish a potent mix of dangerous notions like freedom, originality, creativity, democracy -- concepts that brought forth two or three millennia of great art, science, technology, religion, civic achievement and, often, prosperity.

Heaven knows we haven't done a great job of selling these ideas in recent years, but that doesn't mean we get a pass. We don't get to keep quiet and be agreeable just to get the deal done, because that's a deal we'll end up paying too much for. When the choice is between expression and repression, we still need to speak for those who have no voice.

And when they ask who we are, we'll have to stand up and say: We're the guys telling you the way it is. Even if it's from a fully reclinable seat on the plane ride home.

John Olson is CEO of OLSON, an ad agency with offices in Minneapolis and San Francisco.