Sunday, September 26, 2010

Anti-Smoking & Second Hand Smoke








































These ads are specifically directed toward people who are smokers. The ads are a representation of how smoking damages the lives of the individual as well as the people in their surrounding evironment. I was specifically interested in these ads because I have lost family members due to smoking or second hand smoke. I have seen the dangers of smoking on a personal level and these ads really interest me. These ads are intented for people that do not smoke as well as people who already smoke.
The first ad is an image that reflects the significance of how many deaths actually are releated to smoking compared to those deaths that are non smoking related. The image makes an impact on smokers as well as non smokers to never start smoking.
The second image is related to second hand smoke. The image depicts the message that even if a person does not smoke they are still effected by being surrounded by someone who does. The image of a married woman may cause people to be aware that they could be killing the people that they love. The third image also is related to second smoke as well. This image really affects me because my dad is a smoker. The use of a child makes larger impact on people viewing the ad because he is an innocent bystander. He has no way of changing the environment around him. He is being affected because of the awful habit of superiors around him.
The fourth image is of human lungs made out of cigarettes. The image is a representation of the side effects of smoking on an individual. The image shows black burning lungs. This is trying to show smokers that they are harming their bodies in an extreme way.

The video is supposed to make parents feel guilty for smoking. The video portrays a boy who lost his mom in a public place and starts crying. What if the boy lost his parents forever? This video is intented to make a lastly impression to all parents who are smokers.

The reality of the ads is saddening and disturbing. These ads evoke the same message although they are representing drastic images related to the harmful individual effects and the victims of second hand smoke.

4 comments:

  1. You're right. These pieces don't make us feel good, and they do so not by conveying a message directly (i.e. "Smoking Kills") but through metaphors, and signifiers which connect to other things in our lives. What I've found very interesting about anti-smoking advertisements is that they're very aware that one cannot be convinced not to smoke by force of rational argument, since the addiction is physiological, and thus the ads tend towards influencing other centers of the brain, and how they do that specifically will reveal a lot about these other places in human consciousness -- ample material to analyze for your next assignment.

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  2. I find it interesting how they only focus their message towards smokers themselves. I don't think smokers are typically motivated enough to quit--usually the addiction is so ingraind psychologically that they don't have enough will power to quit. They need support in order to quit.

    I came to the idea that maybe these advertisements would be more effective in accomplishing their goal (that is, getting smokers to quit) if they targeted a different audience, such as their loved ones. I don't typically see anti-smoking advertisements geared toward that audience, but that may be a more effective technique. Usually smokers don't think much of the messages geared towards them since they hear it repeatedly. Encouraging their loved ones to do something to help the smoker may be more effective. I'm not an expert, but it sounds like something that could be tried out.

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  3. The goal of these advertisements is to stir our emotions and make us uncomfortable, or disgusted. This is an advertising tactic that works very well because it makes us not want to smoke or makes us feel guilty if we're smokers. One thing that I believe gets to many people is using children as victims. People instinctively want to protect or keep children safe. But with this their lives are in danger and thats what sells.

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  4. Golygng makes an interesting point in saying that a technique to gain attention is by using children. We all seem to have a compassion for children, which also makes us uncomfortable when we see t.v. commercials involving hungry children in underdeveloped countries.
    I like the ad that has a grassy area in a cemetery with non-smoking written in the area. i think it shows two aspects- 1 in which smoking kills, as well as that smokers play around society and smoke in areas they can while innocent non-smokers are in the same area.

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