I think that the background is meant to make the audience shocked. It has the look of loneliness and sadness. It shows where people may be forced into, to get away from the society that has excluded them. It is used to make people feel empathy, to feel what it may be like to be in their shoes.
Overall, like many people, I found this campaign very offensive as I think that children may see this and get the wrong idea. However no matter how impolite or unpleasant the 1999-2000 Barnados campaign is, I believe that this campaign was extremely effective in showing how desperate and unfortunate people become. Some people in the society today are blinded from these people that were unfortunate in their childhood and did not get the care and the attention needed to achieve a bright future, they perhaps make judgements about these desperate people and they got used to the sight of them and they begin to believe that they got what they deserved, however Barnados showed us that they are it is not their fault, that it may have been influences in their childhood that has driven them to drugs. So no matter how offensive, impolite, or unpleasant these images may be, I still believe that we must not be shielded from the truth.
The copy begins with the most important part of the message that Barnados wants us to understand. It shocks the reader as it uses strong verbs such as ‘battered’, and makes people feel sympathy as it is a violent word. The words chosen makes it sound direct, like it is a common occurrence, The copy on the whole plays with our emotions as it uses such brutal words, although in contrast they then use the word ‘child’. This word symbolises innocence, so the two words contradict with each other. It also shows us that everyone starts out the same, an innocent child however because of the abuse suffered as a child ‘it was always possible’ that John would turn out bad. The use of words makes us think that John had no other option as he would ‘turn to drugs’. This makes us feel empathy, it makes us imagine, what it would be like it be in that situation.
The second paragraph is the total opposite of what happened in the first paragraph. The first paragraph talks about the bad things, whereas the second paragraph gives the solution. ‘Barnados help’ is the shining light, they want to seem like they are able to help the ‘abuse’. The word ‘empty future’’ gives us, the reader the idea of a void. With the choice of words, the paragraph implies that they want you to contribute towards their cause as they add ‘with’ into the sentence of the first line rather than words such as from. The copy uses rhetorical devices to try make people feel that they should help.
On the third paragraph, it starts off by giving a negative view by saying that they ‘no longer run orphanages’, however, they compensate this piece of criticism by mentioning that they still ‘continue’ helping ‘thousands’ of children which also shows the extent of their work and shows that their mission statement has not changed, they still help children.
I think that the fourth and last paragraph may be one of the most important parts of the copy as it gives people the chance to make a difference, to make a ‘donation’. This paragraph works well with the other paragraphs; it persuades people to help. I think it was placed last because it needs the effect of the other paragraphs, to shock people into helping.
The concept behind the phrase ‘Giving children back their future’ was that barnados wanted to save children from their ‘possible futures’. According to their advertising campaign, children were shown doing the things their future selves would from the appalling childhood. The copy describes the disturbed conditions of their childhood, and it explains to use how their lives ended up in the way that they have. So Barnados work to save them from this tragic future, ‘Giving children back their future’.
The 1999-2000 Barnados campaign was very successful. The campaign’s stimulating content made Barnardo’s a subject of a nationwide debate, which took place in various media, such as, newspapers, magazines and on TV. The Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) urged the media not to run the notorious Heroin Baby advertisement (only The Daily Telegraph stuck to the ban). In contrast, the general public did not find it as offensive as CAP. On record, as their website notes only 28 complaints were made to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA). 57% of people surveyed, agreed with Barnados and said that it was ‘shocking but effective’. Barnardo’s head-office received over 300 phone calls of support. As the media cause uproar, this brought a diversity of attention. This along with other factors makes this campaign very successful.
From notes on the Barnados website, as time has passed, more and more articles of this Barnados campaign has showed up which also suggest that this campaign was very successful.
Thomas John Barnardo was born in Dublin in 1845 and he lived until 1900 at the age of 65.when he reached the age of 16 he converted to protestant evangelicalism and he decided to become a medical missionary. He left Dublin and set off for London to train to be a doctor so he would be able to work in China.
When he reached London in 1866, he found that the town was struggling to cope with the effects of the Industrial Revolution. The population had radically increased and most people born were concentrated in the East End, where overcrowding, bad housing, unemployment, poverty and disease were widespread. A few months after he reached London, an outbreak of cholera swept through the East End killing a massive 3,000 people and leaving families penniless. Thousands of children were left homeless and many others were forced to beg after being injured in factories.
In 1867, Thomas Barnardo set up a tattered school in the East End, where deprived children could get a basic education. One evening a boy at the Mission, Jim Jarvis, showed Thomas Barnardo around the East End, showing him the unfortunate children sleeping on roofs and in gutters. This trip changed him in many ways, from that moment on; he devoted his life to helping unfortunate children.
Barnardo opened his first home in 1870, for boys in Stepney Causeway. He regularly went out at night in search of poor boys. One evening, an 11-year old boy, John Somers was turned away because the shelter was full. He was found dead two days later from malnutrition and exposure, from then on the home bore the sign 'No Destitute Child Ever Refused Admission'.
Barnardo later opened the Girls' Village Home in Barkingside, a assortment of cottages around a green, which housed 1,500 girls. By the time a child left Barnardo's they were able to take care of themselves - the girls were equipped with domestic skills and the boys learnt a craft or trade.
Thomas Barnardo strongly believed that families were the appropriate place to bring up children and he established the first fostering scheme when he boarded out children to respectable families in the country. He also introduced a scheme to board out babies of unmarried mothers. The mother went into service nearby and could see her child during her time off.
This was the image of Barnados up till their role changed ad this is what the campaign had to address.
Overall I think that these shocking campaigns are tolerable as most of them have a meaning to them and needs to shock the audience into seeing the truth. Although one of the most recent shocking campagns which caused contraversy is the Fcuk campaign. Whenp ople think of the brand Fcuk, images of models, young people or big major cities such as Paris and London. The word Fcuk obviously is associated with the swear word that we all know and so it makes it a taboo word, however, Fcuk are perfectly happy to carry this campaign out as it associates them with young people, which is likely to be their target group.
Some people believe that Fcuk chose this taboo word, meerly to attract attention, which also does not abide by the advertising code of pratice, which states that no marketeers should use shocking claims or images merely to attract attention. Fcuk are however pleased to allow this as they believe that any attention, whether good or bad is good as both would appeal to the market. Bad attention (when this campaign causes contraversy) would attract the younger market as most of them like the ‘dangerous life’.
Overall I think that this campaign is very sicessful as it attracts attention, and even though it is offensive to some people I believe that it still appeals to their target market and therefore it is very sucessful. Also I think that if charaties can use shocking campaigns, why can’t they?
On the other hand, there are shocking campaigns such as the anti-speeding campaign which was shown on tv all day for children to see, even though the target group of this campaign were not children but adults who do not like to say within the speed limit. It show a young girl, possibly 8 years old, she is laying on the ground next to a tree with her wrist and ankle dislocated and blood trickling down her face. And suddenly the scene is being rewinded, the blood returns, her wrist and ankles fix themselves. She is then being dragged along the floor by a invisible force onto the road and then she breaths in deeply as if that was her breath of life. Words then appear telling us that if you drive at 40 miles per hour, there is 80% chance that she will die, however if you drive at 30 miles per hour, she will have 80% change of living. These words are big and stick into our heads.
