NEWS: New UN Anti-landmine Ad Depicts "Exploding" Children

Broadcasters in the US have balked at showing a graphic and disturbing television public service announcement produced for the United Nations' Mine Action Service. The video depicts young girl soccer players being killed and wounded as a landmine explodes on a soccer field in suburban America.







Hard-hitting advertisements are sometimes required to overcome the desensitization suffered by a Western society constantly exposed to images of hardship through television and other media. However, there is a fine line between "hard-hitting" and "unnecessarily graphic".

***WARNING: GRAPHIC AND DISTURBING FOOTAGE***
The video may be viewed at the U.N Mine Action Website.

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There is no such thing as unneccesary graphic when you are trying to show that your opponent is this monster who is bent on world destruction and that is exactly what the video shows. Although I do agree it was a bit extreme to use children.

Surf

Funny how here in American the media keeps treating us like we are 4 year old children that can not stand some graphics pictures.

surf

I do agree it was a bit extreme to use children

FYI - the third world is chock full of one-legged, blind and maimed children who got exploded by land mines left behind after a "grown-up" conflict.



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Originally posted by marg6043
Funny how here in American the media keeps treating us like we are 4 year old children that can not stand some graphics pictures.

I don't think this will be shown in my native Australia either.

I remember a few years back there were a series of quite graphic television ads in Australia showing road accidents. There was a lot of uproar and protest, but in the end...it worked. The road death toll was reduced considerably while the ad campaigns were running. But before long, as people became desensitized, the effect wore off and the numbers rose back to what they were before. Higher even. So what do you then? Go more graphic? More gruesome? There are limits to how lasting the effect of such images can be.

Originally posted by soficrow

surf
I do agree it was a bit extreme to use children

FYI - the third world is chock full of one-legged, blind and maimed children who got exploded by land mines left behind after a "grown-up" conflict.

And FYI, the ads are being telecasted in America, where an American soccer player gets maimed.

The last thing anyone wants to see in America is their kids being blown apart, but then again, the last thing anyone wants to see, gives more shock than anything else.

Surf

Jesus Christ.

That was one of the most horrific things I've ever seen.

surfup, wecomeinpeace, marg - good points all. ...Maybe we have played out the potential for using graphics. People are numb - and if they're not yet, they will be. ...That's one of the arguments against spanking - kids get immune, and what are ya gonna use then?

...No wonder advertisers are using neuro-marketing. Nothing else works any more. [sigh]



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Wow!

If that was shown every morning on a major television network nationwide during everyones morning breakfast and news hour. I bet we'd get more support for banning mines worldwide.

again... Wow!

Phae

Hey....just curious....anyone seen Starship Troopers? Kind of reminds me of those commercials they showed.

well this ad is arrogant and implies we dont care, this ad would only piss people off instead of making them give more, really, what were they thinking? "landmines may not be in your backyard, but they're in the backyards of people all over the world" wtf this is exaggerated and misleading for one and trying to guilt people, what the billions they get for landmine clearing every year isnt enough? they are only using this to patronise people, not to help.

Originally posted by Phaethor
If that was shown every morning on a major television network nationwide during everyones morning breakfast and news hour. I bet we'd get more support for banning mines worldwide.

Exactly. For about...say..a year. What about the imagery of starving children in Ethiopia? I remember being glued to the television and nearly being brought to tears when they first appeared on the television. I begged my parents (I was a teenager at the time) to send money, etc etc. Yet, much as I hate to admit it, after a year or so the appearance of a starving child with flies on his face on my TV was the signal to change channels or get a snack.

I guess you can't say that the inevitable desensitization negates the need for shocking imagery, but perhaps it's not enough on it's own. Only when combined with education and a more broad-ranging raising of awareness levels does it have any lasting effect. Everybody knows the dangers of the AIDS virus, yet we don't have gruesome pictures of AIDS sufferers splashed all over our screens. Then again, perhaps that isn't a fair comparison because the motivation behind avoiding AIDS is self-preservation, whereas the motivation behind helping those worse off than us is self-sacrifice; a much more difficult virtue to stir.

I'm rethinking as I type, and I figure if such graphic imagery can save one single kid from getting his legs blown off, then I'm all for it. Just maybe keep it after prime-time when the kids are in bed.

Originally posted by soficrow
That's one of the arguments against spanking - kids get immune, and what are ya gonna use then?

A leather strap or a piece of wood.

*joke joke*

What? desensitized? I never became "desensitized" after a whomp from my mom. You get smacked upside the head you learn not to do whatever it was you did. But going "pat, pat" ok go play GC now doesn't work. A love tap is a love tap, a smack upside the head makes you learn not to do what you did.

Anyways, yes, they are just exag. the situation, it is just Iraq, Afganistan, Vietnam, places that we put them in, not all over the world.

Originally posted by James the Lesser
Anyways, yes, they are just exag. the situation, it is just Iraq, Afganistan, Vietnam, places that we put them in, not all over the world.

No , across the world there are these.
Africa, russia and asia three of the largest continents on earth.

Was being sarcastic....... they seem to think this is all hype, there aren't any landmines, all UN propaganda...

5 kids, under the age of 16, lose an arm or leg each day to land mines
The fastest growing business in veitnam and cambodia, is prosthetics
each time you read about a flood in nicaragua, or veitnam, there is a rise in landmine deaths or wounding dues to landmines displaced and floated out.

and people are whining about a commercial...grow Up.