This anti-bullying ad from France seems to be asking one simple question:
If we don’t expect adults to torture and torment one another in the workplace, why do we allow kids to do it at school?
This ad takes us out of the settings we’re used to seeing bullying happen: In schools, and amongst children.
Removing us from that, we can no longer excuse the behavior as normal. We’d never tolerate this behavior among our employees, so why do so many adults (parents and teachers, even) think bullying is a rite of passage?
It’s not.
Bullying is cruelty. It is torture—emotionally and often physically as well.
Bystanders can change the world. Let this ad sink in, and then do something to change the culture that calls bullying “normal”.
Let’s get this ad on every major network here in the USA and see if we can help make a change and some save kids from the torment we see every day in most schools.
This ad is aimed at grown-ups for a reason—we’re the ones who can protect these kids.
Luke , if you are from Australia how can there be African Americans there ? Would they not be African Australians ? This is not about race, but about how this would and could happen in an adult environment. No child or adult should ever be subjected to bullying. Ever !
Saw this one a week or so ago – VERY effective.
A good start. It should be noted, however, that by depicting the ridiculousness of adults engaging in bullying, the PSA misses the kinds of bullying that happens in workplaces: sexism, homonegativity, transphobia, ageism, etc.
It didn’t escape me that the on,y people who appeared in the PSA were white men.
This ad is very specific to one thing, and it is French, not American. Not surprising that it’s not as diverse as we’d like in the US.
I dont think an ad that’s supposed to depict childhood-style bully can or even should talk about workplace bullying. That’s not what it’s about, despite the fact that it takes place in a workplace. That would cloud the issue.
It hasn’t escaped me (I am white) that the only people who have ever screwed me over are white people. I can’t remember a single incident in school of being bullied by an Aboriginal, African American, Papa New Guinian, Asian or Indian. I am sure it happens in other races and cultures but as a rule in a primarily white school the minorities already have there own problems with racism to start bullying other kids.
I like the ad, its a good start.
I don’t think it goes far enough though. Its rather tame and it only shows the lighter stuff of what goes on in ordinary schools. But I guess it is a case of at least there is something out there.
Great ad – very powerful. Luke – Not sure tame is the right word if you considered actually witnessing this happening. The thing is, if we consider something like this tame we are more likely to let it go as ‘just a bit of fun’. It is then it escalates to the things you are probably referring to. We need to recognise the signs from the beginning and significantly lower our tolerance levels. I agree with you that it’s a good start. Sometimes going for the big shock stuff just numbs people to it because it can be seen as… Read more »
True I guess. I’m an Australian and a smoker we have the pictures on our smokes of the various cancers and harm smoking can do and I must admit I haven’t looked at them in years. Some of the stuff I went through would land an adult in jail for 10 years yet in school no one gives it even a second thought. So maybe if there was a series of them and this was the first and they showed how things escalated. I honestly think though that there is a level of denial about what goes on but how… Read more »