There’s something about certain PSA’s that just seem so far fetched. They set up these crazy scenarios with absolutely nutso happenings. I’m gonna post a few and give my critiques.
UK Texting While Driving PSA
This one’s circling the interwebs right now. True, using your phone while driving isn’t the smartest idea but this video just portrays something ridiculous. How about we show the annoying parts like, oh you know, the guy you rear ended and having to wait on the cop and having to collect insurance and having to pay to get your bumper fixed and having to go to court or just paying off the $100 or so ticket. That’s more of a reality. This is like, cars flying everywhere. Especially the one that t-bones them, where did it come from? The magical forrest? Did that car not see them from the 100 yards back from whence it was coming and slow the f*ck down? K, done ranting. Mediocre job.
Australian Drugs and Driving Ad
Ok this one is just insane. I guess it’s closer to reality because it’s just something random that could happen because you weren’t paying attention…but wait, that’s just it! It’s something that could happen regardless of drugs. You could just step out of your car to switch drivers because you’re tired, not notice someone coming by and all of a sudden, kaputz. Stay away from that reefer or you’ll get rund over.
Above The Influence ‘Human Puppet’ PSA
I swear. Kids these days. Is this what they do now? Well I’ve actually never ever ever done this. Maybe once, and the person was probably awake and let us. Whatever the scenario, it was funny and there were no drugs or alcohol involved. It was just college kids goofing off. I suppose this is embarrassing but I could think of far worse things to be done to someone who was passed out.
Above The Influence ‘Fitting In’ PSA
Now for the good! This PSA is great. It’s cool, it’s simple, it’s not pushy and it’s got a great tune. I will watch this PSA over and over and over and over. The kid makes his choices and still gets to do cool stuff. This one just doesn’t portray any ridiculous situation or happening and for that, I give it a thumbs up.
Conclusion
I guess I should end by saying I don’t think any of these are necessarily wrong just that they don’t portray accurately what happens. They pick out the 1% chance of something absurd happening and use that. It’s like when you’re in church as a little kid and you get really scared of going to hell so you go down front, say a prayer and/or get baptized. It doesn’t really mean anything. You just did it cos you were scared and once that wears off you’ll be back to the same shenanigans.
4 Comments
We worked up a TV spot about texting here, and it’s not about blood and death. Statistics show kids don’t care about that. They do care about the ticket. As much as I’ve seen this video flying around, I assume that ‘moms’ (and other adults) do care about the blood. Guess it’s an age thing.
you’re completely right. completely. in reality the ticket is the annoying/expensive part.
Nice read. I agree the last one is great. I think that they are completely missing their target audience with the other ones. I mean they could be put into Final Destination and blend seamlessly (minus the accents) The point being is they are not very creative thus not sticking out. Our generation has been raised on gore and crazy crap on tv show us something original to really prove a point.
yup. showing us that 1% chance rarely works. i was talking about this with a friend last night. people need to have an actual understanding of why texting & driving is an unsafe idea. not that you’re gonna crash and die. understanding is key to most issues like this, especially when it comes to parenting.