Years ago, while working as a graphic designer, I presented a project logo to my client, an NGO. After a brief review, one of the board members said the logo reminded him of a gun. No one else, by any measure, could see what he was talking about, but everyone, while agreeing that it was a great logo, certainly didn’t want their project associated with guns.
I repeat, no one else could see how this logo (that everyone else loved) could ever be mistaken for a gun. Nevertheless, the clients curled up into conservatism, and disabused themselves of any associations with imaginary guns and the logo was changed, changed again and again. No one, not even me, remembers how it turned out. As to why the NGO’s project ultimately failed…