Richard Wagner believed that recurring musical themes could help audiences navigate the complexity of opera. Theodor Adorno worried that the same device would eventually become an emotional shortcut. Music would cease to unfold as an intellectual experience and instead become a catalogue of recognisable moments. Familiarity would triumph over difficulty. In my previous column, The Virtue of Difficulty, I argued that contemporary culture rewards recognition over reflection. If that diagnosis was correct, another question follows. Who benefits when familiarity becomes the dominant language of public life?

The obvious answer is corporate advertisers. Yet modern advertising rarely attempts classical persuasion. It no longer invites consumers to compare products or weigh competing claims. Its first ambition is simpler. It wants to become familiar. Repeated exposure alters judgement in subtle ways: it lowers the effort needed to accept a claim, and that ease is easily mistaken for truth.

Pakistani popular culture offers clear illustrations of this process.

Consider Pepsi’s relationship with Pakistani cricket. The brand did not simply sponsor the game. It embedded itself within its emotional memory. Those who grew up in the 1990s remember the Pepsi advertisement in which computer graphics made Saqlain Mushtaq’s spinning ball roll across his shoulders before returning from one palm to the other. A generation later, Pakistan’s World Cup squad was filmed playing one-tip cricket at the airport en route to Colombo, competing not for silverware but for the last bottle of Pepsi. More recently, the “Why Not Meri Jaan” campaign invited supporters to treat loyalty itself as a virtue. As Babar Azam’s form regressed, the campaign redirected attention from performance to belief. Pepsi no longer needed to persuade consumers that its drink was superior. It had associated itself so often........

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