I know it seems unlikely, but I can’t help but wonder if this glorious piece of stupidity is a conspiracy of the Australian meat industry.
Why would the meat industry create a video (for airing in cinemas and on television) for Animals Australia a pro-animal organization that’s campaigning against factory farming and the cruelty it inflicts on animals?
Well, take a look. I think you’ll see what I mean.
(This is a long video, more than 11 minutes, but the Stupid Ad part is at the beginning.)
(Or watch it here on Vimeo.)
Take note of the song they’re singing: “There’s a Place for Us” from West Side Story. Sung by the main characters when their messed-up world is about to get very much worse, and they find out there is not a place for them.
Oops. Things are not looking good for the pigs and chickens.
Okay, I can almost overlook that, since not everyone will think about the story, but take the song at face value.
But then the ad hits us with a blinding flash of utter stupidity: The a pig sprouts wings and flies away from the factory.
So the message? How could it be anything but: There will be no more factory farming … when pigs have wings!
That is, never. That interpretation is pretty much unavoidable.
I wondered if I was missing something, so I asked alert reader Sean Triner in Australia if the “… when pigs have wings” idiom has the same currency and meaning Down Under as it does in the US.
Alas, it does. This is a video that clearly states that factory farming is permanent and inevitable. Who’d waste their time campaigning against it?
I can see only two explanations for this video:
- The Australian meat industry secretly did this to undermine public opposition to factory farming by persuading everyone that it will never end.
- The agency creatives who produced this stupid ad were so in love with their goofy concept and high-end production that they didn’t notice they directly contradicted the message they meant to make, and did so more clearly and loudly than the message itself.
Sadly, I’m afraid it’s #2.
I prefer the other explanation. It’s more interesting.
More Stupid Nonprofit Ads.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Jan 4th, 2013. Comment. 
The Ad Council is a juicy source of some real Stupid Nonprofit Ad action.
That’s too bad, because they’ve done some great work in the past. But apparently the forces of clever abstractionism are so strong in the ad industry all you’re going to get when agencies donate their time is self-indulgent, high-production conceptual abstractions.
Like this one, done to encourage donations post Super Storm Sandy:
(Or watch it here on YouTube.)
Get it? Money can turn into anything. So give money!
Give us a break.
Let’s remember the central fact about fundraising: People give to touch people. If you want to unlock their philanthropy, you need to show them who needs help. During times of disaster, this becomes very easy to do, because the news media are putting those images and stories everywhere donors look.
People do not give because they’re impressed by your cleverness and production prowess.
This is the Ad Council, which apparently acts in a vacuum. But these same ad agency geniuses would love to do similar work for you. Just say no!
Thanks to Osocio for the tip.
More Stupid Nonprofit Ads.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Nov 21st, 2012. Comment.
Some causes are harder to raise funds for than others. One of the toughest assignments is raising funds to help people who are perceived to have got themselves into their problem in the first place.
Lung cancer is in that category. Because of decades of successful anti-smoking marketing, everyone knows about the correlation between smoking and lung cancer. Some people have the attitude that those who have lung cancer “brought it on themselves” by smoking. Which is ridiculous.
I’m giving you what I assume was the brief for a campaign by the Lung Cancer Alliance and noonedeservestodie.org. The goal, I guess, was to encourage a more compassionate and sensible response toward lung cancer, which should lead to more financial support.
Let’s see how well it succeeds:
Or see it here on YouTube.
There’s a print/outdoor version too:
This campaign was reported recently in the New York Times, at Cancer Campaign Tries Using Shock to Change Attitudes, as an example of “shockvertising” — the theory that you can get a lot more attention by being shocking.
It’s true that being shocking will probably get you more attention, and has got this campaign attention. Problem is, just getting attention doesn’t accomplish anything. You have to get the right kind of attention. Just making people angry about something you said but didn’t really mean is of no value.
This campaign is in trouble because it invites misunderstanding. It’s based on misdirection — not just once, but in two layers:
Cat lovers deserve to die
Oh — ha, ha. That was a misdirection. What we really meant to say was:
Cat lovers deserve to die … If they have lung cancer
Gotcha! That was a misdirection too! I bet you’re so confused you’re more open to considering what we really want to say:
Many people believe that if you have lung cancer you did something to deserve it. It sounds absurd, but it’s true. Lung cancer doesn’t discriminate and neither should you.
If you’ve spent any time in the trying-to-make-people-understand-you field, you may have noticed that any time you say something contrary to what you want people to get, they don’t get it. They think you mean what you say. When you say “cat lovers deserve to die,” they think you’re a creep. When you amend that with “If they have lung cancer,” they think you’re some kind of monster.
And they stop paying attention.
And they don’t change their attitude.
And they don’t give any money to a worthy cause they’d no doubt have been open to supporting — if they’d been competently approached.
Once again, an ad agency has applied flawed advertising logic to nonprofit marketing. Just say no!
More Stupid Nonprofit Ads.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Jul 26th, 2012. Comment.
Hey, I have a great idea for a fundraising campaign. Here’s the brief:
- Even though it’s about suffering children, don’t show any children. (Nobody is emotionally connected to children anymore, right?)
- The centerpiece will be a series of images that most people will not be able to identify. (That’ll make them pay more attention, right?)
- Explain the image with a slogan that completely undercuts the cause. (Cognitive dissonance!)
Okay, not such a good idea. But it seems to be the brief for this agency-created campaign for War Child, a UK nonprofit. Here’s one of the ads:
There are several other print ads (or posters?) in the campaign, and even a video on YouTube, none of which sheds any more light on the message:
It’s easy to convince children that killing is a game.
Think about that slogan for a moment. If you personally know any children, the falsity of it is breathtaking. In fact, the monsters who create child soldier don’t lure them in with fun and games — they do it with appalling violence and drugs. They psychologically destroy the child to turn him into a killer.
And if it were true that it’s easy to convince children that killing is a game, saying so would be an ineffective way to arouse the empathy of potential donors. Apparently, in the alternate universe where this ad agency is located, children are just one step away from being war criminals.
Like most Stupid Nonprofit Ads, the whole premise is an insanely ill-conceived visual metaphor. You probably didn’t realize those things on the posters were weapons made from balloons — much less the point they’re trying to make.
I hope nobody paid for this disaster. Even more, I hope nobody outside the “look-at-our-cool-pro-bono-ad” echo chamber sees the misleading message.
Thanks to Creative Advertisements for NGO for the tip.
More Stupid Nonprofit Ads.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Jun 9th, 2012. Comment.
If you make an ad for beer, chances are you’re not going to show a whole lot of beer. After all:
- All beer looks about the same, and it doesn’t look interesting.
- All beer tastes pretty much the same.
- All beer has roughly the same affect on you.
So beer ads tend to be abstract and indirect. It’s babes, sports, and jokes, not beer.
You don’t have to do that if what you’re pushing is saving the lives of kids who have cancer. Being straightforward and literal covers it for you with emotion and depth.
But not according to an ad agency that recently did some work for the Dutch cancer charity KIKA (Kinderen Kanker Vrij, or Children Cancer Free). They took the beer-ad approach of pushing something other than the issue at hand.
Check out this print ad:
No kids. No humans at all. No cancer, no need, no tragedy, no triumph.
Just a mild joke. I chuckled a little, once I figured it out.
Helping kids in need is one of the most potent motivators in existence. If your cause has anything to do with helping children, you are automatically several steps ahead of everyone else in the race to influence donors.
Helping children is not anything like selling beer.
So if an ad agency comes to you with a bold plan to replace children with a joke, or some wordplay, or an abstraction, or symbolism — tell them no thanks. No matter how sophisticated and clever they make it sound.
Thanks to Osocio for the tip. You can also find other examples of the campaign there.
More Stupid Nonprofit Ads.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on May 1st, 2012. Comment.