Four five six, it's a health mnemonic

My mom was a teacher, before she ended up staying home with four kids.But she never lost the spark for teaching. So, in addition to our regular schooling, we all got tutored at home. One of Mom's favourite teaching tactics was the mnemonic device. In fact, just last weekend, she successfully taught my 5-year-old son how to memorize a licence plate by making the letters and numbers into words in a sentence.

Since the days of oral history, many different mnemonic devices have been used to help people remember important things: structured verse, allegory, metaphor, and of course the simple rhyme. But as we became a literate society, the simplest of these powerful cultural devices was relegated to song, bad poetry, nursery rhymes... and... oh, yeah! Advertising:



Having a child now, and watching how easy it is for him to memorize AC/DC lyrics (I'll never forget when he burst into "Let's Get it Up" in the grocery store) I have been re-evaluating old ad methods that I once thought played out. And so when the City of Ottawa challenged us to come up with a campaign to brand the local promotion of Environment Canada's Air Quality Health Index, I drew inspiration from my Mom, Schoolhouse Rock, and Canadian songstress Feist:



(Let's pause for a fanboy crush moment.)

Anyway, the AQHI is a new measure of air quality and how it affects health. From EC:

It is a health protection tool that is designed to help you make decisions to protect your health by limiting short-term exposure to air pollution and adjusting your activity levels during increased levels of air pollution. It also provides advice on how you can improve the quality of the air you breathe.

This index pays particular attention to people who are sensitive to air pollution and provides them with advice on how to protect their health during air quality levels associated with low, moderate, high and very high health risks.

One of the chalenges of this campaign is that there is another index, the Air Quality Index, that also measures pollution levels. It goes to 100 and above. But our job was to differentiate AQHI as a simple tool to help people in general — and especially people at risk — plan their daily activities. We took the scale of ten, and broke it into four easy, colour-coded pieces, and started planting the scale all over town:



This is a fairly modest-budget campaign, so your tax dollars are working quite hard on this one. Now, we're working on a social media strategy to help spread the word over the summer. While it is still in development, you can visit the AQHI Facebook Page and "like" it to sign up for AQHI updates and news.

So, hopefully, people will know what to do the next time manmade smog, climate, or Quebec forest fires cause the air to look like this:



That was a nine, my friends. A NINE.

Next time that happens (hopefully not soon), I'll heed the AQHI number and take the bus instead of burning out my lungs by walking to work.

Child abuse ads too hardcore for soft rock

"I want to talk to you about a subject many people try to ignore - child sexual abuse.

Each year in Pennsylvania thousands of children are sexually abused and most cases are never reported.

Without help these children may have a lifetime of mental health issues.

But there is hope - you. If you believe a child is being sexually abused, please visit heroproject.org or call 1-887-874-HERO."

That's the text of a 30-second radio PSA produced by The Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape (PCAR) that, according to their press release and blog, has been rejected by WBEB 101.1FM in Philadelphia.

To hear the radio spots for yourself, click here.

According to PCAR:

"WBEB's General Manager Blaise Howard offered PCAR space only if it altered the wording to remove the word "rape" from the organization's name and say "child abuse" instead of "child sexual abuse," citing that the station's listeners would be upset by the words that are currently used.

Howard stated to PCAR's executive director that WBEB doesn't take "explicit ads" because they are a "straight laced" company. However, the station does play sexually suggestive music by artists such as Prince, Madonna, Lady GaGa and George Michael."

PCAR Executive Director Delilah Rumburg added:

"Child sexual abuse is not about sexuality. It's about violence to our children. If the station doesn't believe its listeners could handle hearing words about abuse, imagine what child victims of sexual abuse are experiencing."

"We believe that our message is important to Pennsylvanians. All we are trying to do is get information out to the public that there is help and healing for survivors and their families. We don't feel that modifying the language is an acceptable compromise. The station is asking us to censor information that could actually help their listeners. Their decision is appalling and perpetuates the veil of silence that continues to hurt victims in need of help."

I can understand parents having concern about their young children hearing these messages (my 5-year-old son runs away and hides when ads about abuse or child poverty come on Discovery Channel) but this is an adult-oriented radio station. If any good can come from this epic fail on the part of the station, it will be to make even stronger PCAR's point about the need to overcome "polite" denial in the fight to stop child sexual abuse.

PCAR is urging Philadelphia residents to call the station and voice their displeasure with the soft rock radio station and to ask the station to make a substantial donation to their local rape crisis centers. For those of us outside the City of Brotherly Love, perhaps it's worth considering if we would complain to a station that bruised our delicate sensibilities by telling the hard truth about abuse.

There are also TV spots (non-embeddable) available for viewing at the HERO project web site.

Don't get mad...

Caught an interesting press release from the Canadian Labour Congress yesterday:

The Canadian Labour Congress wants to know why CHUM-FM is refusing to play an ad to promote awareness about Canada's unacceptably high workplace death rate.

The ad, nicknamed "Its Not Funny" was produced to promote information about the fact that over 1,000 Canadians died because of unsafe working conditions last year. It features the voice of a man who is outraged at the situation, nothing obscene, nothing slanderous, nothing that comes remotely close to pushing any boundaries. However, CHUM-FM has refused to put it on the air.

You can check out the ad for yourself right here: MP3

The CLC was the only source I could find online for comment from the stations:

"The excuse we were given was that people will tune out because they don't want to hear outrage on the radio, which is beyond ridiculous because that's the bread and butter of many talk radio stations"

They have a point, there. When I think of radio today, in my head I hear the unwelcome outrage of shock jocks and shameless pundits. Having listened to the ad in question, I don't see what could possibly upset radio listeners who endure hours of early morning DJs.

But I may have found some clue as to the particular sensitivity of CHUM listeners to on-air negativity in this user comment:

larsh (Apr 30, 2009 @ 06:09PM)

I am personally tired of the Dr. Marla Swine Flu updates on the morning show. 4 days in a row is uncessary! I know you are trying to calm people, but I think you are creating fear instead. (Do you really need DAILY updates?). I personally like to hear discussions about "lighter" topics when i am driving in the morning. The traffic is stressful enough!

Yes, let's stop worrying about staying on top of a rapidly-growing global health crisis because traffic is already so difficult to deal with. Just like it's too upsetting to hear a guy get angry about the thousands of Canadians who die from unsafe workplaces when you could be laughing about Britney's stripper pole.

That's just sad. I think we need to get our priorities straight.