Like you, I woke up this morning with all this news about “The Return Of The King”. Alex Bogusky is back, after wandering the desert for the past six months and it seems that he has seen his Burning Bush, and is now going to represent the interests of the consumer in his next venture. So the ad man has really turned advocate.

If you follow the advertising landscape then you already know about Alex, and his recent bombshell of an announcement that he was leaving the game. Done. Exit. Outta here. The venerable Fat Lady was about to sing. And so Alex packed his bag, and began to climb down from that pedestal that we put him on. The collective we, because we pretty much bought everything he sold to us. And he sold a lot. But somewhere along the path of pushing giant hamburgers loaded with fat, and “meat-flavored” cologne, Alex had an epiphany.

“But as I looked at what was happening around me, I didn’t want to miss out. I wanted to be free to pick and choose to participate in things without conflict, without guilt.”

So Alex did what any ad man with a conscience would do… he moved to Boulder, became a vegetarian, and now, has moved from the Dark Side to become a voice from the wilderness to the very people that he held sway over all these years. Not that this is a bad thing, mind you. I can totally get behind it, as I too have had, at times, my own crisis of conscience with the work I was either doing or representing. At some point, I didn’t want to feel badly about my 9-5. So i quit, like Alex did, sans press release, or I was fired for being “unrepresentative” and “vocal – resulting in a negative atmosphere”.

Maybe its a growing trend? Super Villians becoming Super Heroes after being confronted with the truth of their action, or seeing the burden of humanity, and catching the faint aroma of empathy. As pointed out in a recent article in Wired, the bad dude in Despicable Me becomes good after a heavy dose of cotton candy and a generous helping of Love. Hollywood is littered with bad guys gone good after they take in the aftermath of their evil ways. And I think that this is what happened with Alex.

For me, over the last several months, my fortitude has come from family, friends, acquaintances and strangers who listened to me and pushed me forward. Along the way, I’ve met the most amazing people.

After leaving the ad game, I think that Alex took a walk around the park. He saw what he, and the ad industry in general has created – a society of mass consumerism that feeds upon the viscous cycle of more, and he did not like what he saw. And he felt responsible. Just read this article from Alex, and you will know what I mean. He tells the tale better than I would. After all, it is his story.

So now the ad man is a consumer advocate. Its a fairly large leap of faith, and even Alex admits to that. He states “What does this make me? I think I’ll be a consumer advocate for a while. I’m not sure a former advertising executive is allowed to become a consumer advocate, but I plan to give it a shot.” Who better to step into that role than the guy that engineered all of this ideas that got us to buy the products that inevitably are killing us? Hell, its like Alex stole a play out of Don Draper’s book, similar to when the Mad Men Creative Director takes out a full page ad denouncing cigarettes, the very industry that allowed him to have his own agency, and steps over to educate the “Cancer Guys” on the campaign tactics that sold cigarettes in the first place.

“Wish me luck.”

So Alex has now taken out his full page ad, in the form of an agency. I do wish him luck. I think its a great idea, and an idea that is long over due. Somewhere tucked in here is my desire for responsible advertising and a different level of accountability. Obviously the evidence of how the internet has amplified the “voice of the consumer” will be kicked a bunch, and some new social media guru will try and own an advocacy tipping point with another acronym or three. Anyway…

We all need religion. I am learning this first hand. We need something to hold us accountable for our actions, and to create in us the desire to atone for some things, and to celebrate others. It seems that Alex has indeed had his “Jesus moment”. And in my book, that is a good thing.