5 Retarded Health Campaigns That Backfired (Hilariously)
Can you imagine how unhealthy we'd be if we didn't have large organizations spending millions on public health campaigns? If we didn't have them to herd us around with their slogans and posters, our lives would be a nightmare of illicit drugs and bad choices.
Shockingly, however, these well-meaning programs sometimes don't work out so well.
#5.
The D.A.R.E. Program May Increase Drug Use
Damn near every school kid in the United States has been forced to sit through the Drug Abuse Resistance Education Program (D.A.R.E.) at least once. Good ol' Officer Friendly shows up once a month or so and leads the class through obnoxious skits intended to give them an idea what peer pressure is like and how to avoid it. Spoiler alert! You avoid it by just saying "no!"
Apparently, that works for everything from drugs to unwanted sexual advances to strong-armed robbery. But it's more than just saying no, the program aims to equip young people with "creative" ways by which to say it. For the record, we generally incorporate some sort of interpretive dance when we spurn unwanted offers of sex and drugs. But we don't dance that often, if you know what we mean, ladies.
On the surface, encouraging kids to say no to drugs seems like a fine idea. What could go wrong?
Whoops!
It would be hard to actually know how well a program like D.A.R.E. was working unless you, say, kept track of a thousand or so kids who went through the program and then caught up with them 10 years later. So that's exactly what some people did.
Two separate studies, the results of which were prominently reported by TIME, indicated that at the very least D.A.R.E. was ineffective, but at its worst actually pushed kids toward drug use and lowered self esteem. Researchers suspect that the overstated, "peer pressure is around every corner, because EVERYONE IS DOING DRUGS BUT YOU!" message made some kids actually want to get high as a way of fitting in. If everyone else is doing it, why shouldn't they?
Look at you, just saying no to drugs, and friends, and a well-adjusted childhood.
The studies argued that the program's use of "drugs are everywhere, fucking run!" type of messages amounted to hyperbole, and kids don't like hyperbole. All it takes is the kid having one drug-using friend for him to recognize that, no, a single bong hit can't make your brain go running out of your ears like strawberry jam. And if that part is wrong, hell, maybe the whole thing is.
When are we going to figure out that even kids have bullshit detectors?
#4.
England's Beat Bullying Campaign Gets Kids Beaten
Remember that one time when we all had this big problem and then we bought a bunch of wristbands and it went away? England's Beat Bullying campaign hoped to replicate that success in their fight against the generations-old problem of surly douchebags at school.
The idea behind the program was to sell blue wristbands that kids would wear to school to signify that they thoroughly reject bullying in all its forms, be it a physical attack, like the dreaded swirlie for example, or a more subtle form, like a YouTube video of your mom earning her "coolest" title the hard way with a group of your classmates. Kids weren't going to take it anymore. Unlike that mom of yours, who takes it all the time (if you know what we mean).
Even celebrities got in on the act, buying up wristbands by the boatload and wearing them to prominent events. We know what you're going to ask. The answer is yes, there is a picture of Bono coming up. Right now, in fact.
"Yeah, one punch and the little nerd went down. Then I took this bracelet from him."
In February of 2005, David Beckham handed out the millionth wristband to 13-year-old Jess Sparrow, who happily proclaimed "I'm here with David Beckham. It's fantastic. I hope no one has to suffer bullying ever again." Nope, that should about take care of it. Thanks, Beckham!
Whoops!
When trying to avoid the wrath of the school bully, it's best to not do anything that may attract their attention, like buying royal blue wristbands for yourself and everyone else in your World of Warcraft guild to wear to school. Almost immediately after the program was implemented in the nation's schools, kids wearing the blue wristband were, naturally, targeted by bullies.
One reason kids were targeted was because of the scarcity of the bracelets. The campaign was so popular at its launch that supplies of the "Beat Bullying" wristbands quickly sold out. Prices on eBay skyrocketed, reaching $32 each. Not a bad day's haul for an enterprising young bully.
Even when strong armed robbery wasn't involved, kids were just targeted because they were wearing the wristband. According to one student, "They basically thought 'Hey! Everyone who's wearing a wristband must be scared of bullying!' So they decided to bully the people wearing wristbands. So, it's made a difference, but not a good one." A ringing endorsement for a campaign that continues to this day.
#3.
Nebraska's "Give Us Your Troubled Child" Law Somehow Backfires
"Safe haven" laws are nothing new, they just say that a parent can drop their infant child off at any hospital with no questions asked, if for some reason they feel they are not fit to care for the child. They are often referred to as "Baby Moses Laws" after the ancient story of Baby Moses being left in a wicker basket hidden in tall grass to keep him from being slain by the Israelites. The current safe haven laws are in place for the exact same reason, except these days the "Israelites" are called "shitty moms who throw their kids in dumpsters," as adorably depicted in the photo below.
It really is a noble program, and has probably saved countless infants from an unnecessary and cruel demise. The operative word there being "infants."
Whoops!
In most states, safe haven laws have an age limit of anywhere from 30 to 60 days. That's why, although they've been around for some time, most safe haven laws don't cause a multiple episodes of Dr. Phil generating a shit storm of outrage. Not so with the Nebraska Safe Haven law. The problems with the Nebraska version of safe haven began pretty much the minute some dipshit decided that including an age limit wasn't really necessary. Technically, under the original version of the Nebraska Safe Haven law, any child could be dropped off by their parents and the state had to take them in.
"My mom says she can't take care of me anymore. Can I have a beer?"
This fact was not lost on scores negligent parents, who suddenly began arriving from as far away as Florida to drop off their ill-mannered and mentally troubled youngsters. But the shit really hit the fan when a 34-year-old man dropped nine, yes, NINE kids off at a Nebraska hospital, ranging in age from one to 17. Before state officials had time to amend the law, more parents were showing up with teenagers in tow.
Naturally, like all moral uproars in the United States, the Nebraska Safe Haven law uproar prompted Dr. Phil to chime in with his condescending two cents. If only there was somewhere we could drop him off...
I had to sit through D.A.R.E. at least once a year from kindergarten to about the 8th grade. They told us such ridiculously over-exaggerated horror stories that even in 1st grade I was thinking "this is bullshit".
Reply(I had a potty mouth.)
I guess it was supposed to be a joke that the writer got the Moses story so "comically" wrong? You'd think he would have been even more hyperbolic and anachronistic to make it clear he knew he was being inaccurate. Something like "baby Moses was hidden in tall grass to keep him away from Michael Jackson"
ReplyI remember D.A.R.E. and I remember getting a red ribbon to wear. You'd wear that thing proudly in elementary school. Then I turned 16 and smoked pot. I don't do any drugs now(age 27) but I tried some stuff back then. D.A.R.E. was not even a memory to me at the point that I did it. I didn't try pot because my friends did, I tried it because they didn't die from it. I just wanted to see what this big bad evil thing was that "the man" hated so much. Another hilarious campaign they had at my junior high was the "abstinence wall". Once a year these people would come to my junior high and tell us not to have any sexual contact with another person, not even masturbation because it's all wrong and we need to control ourselves. Then they would tell us to sign a wall pledging our abstinence until marriage. I would always sign it like "Mike Hawk"(say it outloud) or "Harry Sack" and we'd all laugh about it. What a stupid thing that was. They would also give us a ribbon that said "Pledged Virgin Until Marriage" which was utterly ridiculous.
ReplyI'm kind of surprised we've survived this long, seeing as how we need to be told not to put babies in a f*****g dumpster.
ReplyBaby Moses Laws" after the ancient story of Baby Moses being left in a wicker basket hidden in tall grass to keep him from being slain by the Israelites
ReplyAre you on crack?
oooh, as reported by TIME, the most prestigious of medical journals!
ReplyNow I know why those wristbands were banned in our school...After all those years spent hating our head of year...
ReplyThe whole bit about making tobacco companies fund anti-smoking campaigns is kind of silly to begin with. They should have been forced to (generously) compensate the victims and families of deceased victims of the generations who actually thought smoking was safe, and if individuals in the industry could be identified who knew were instrumental in the coverup, by all means charge them with mass murder. But don't try to tell me that people today are still ignorant of how lethal tobacco is, ESPECIALLY don't be so condescendingly racist as to say "the poor, especially persons of color" think the Newports they smoke are harmless. I'm definitely not a libertarian, but a company has the right to promote its products, as long as it doesn't lie in the course of doing so, and the public is made aware of any risks associated with using said products. Same goes for fast food, PC clowns like Morgan Spurlock shed a tsunami of crocodile tears about McDonald's advertizing that poor "inner city" people are apparently incapably of resisting (my favorite bit in Super Size Me was when he dropped two thoroughly disproven urban legends in a single sentence, that cheese contains opiates and that sugar is a neuro-stimulant akin to caffeine).
ReplyParagraph breaks, for the love of God.
The argument that the poor are fatter than the wealthy rings true. Going to the supermarket yesterday to pick up all the ingredients I needed for vegetarian lasagna ran me about 13$ for 4 servings (one slice was about 150 calories), and took me about 90 minutes to prepare and cook. True there were time and money saving alternatives but they're all super calorie dense so you'd need to eat even more of it to feel full. Stoufer's Lasagna cooks in half the time and costs about $9 but has nearly 3x the calorie count per serving, which is pretty outrageous. Processed foods are insanely calorie dense, but going to a super market and not buying something processed is a surprising challenge. People buy them because they're cheap and fast and if you've got 3 kids that last thing you want to do when you get home from a 12 hour shift as a line cook making $8 an hour is stand in the kitchen for 90 minutes cooking. Its not like that time ist being wasted either, they're doing laundry and cleaning and getting their kids ready for school and balancing their budgets and a million other things that wealthy people outsource to "the help".
Yeah I can spend 90 minutes making a meal for myself cause I have the money to spend on relatively expensive food and I don't have to worry about feeding a family, and still have the time to get up and exercise for 2 hours in the morning, but I honestly can't see how a poor family of 4 could do it.
Egyptians not Israelites. It was the Israelites children that were targeted for murder by pharoh and the Egyptians because Pharohs sorcerers predicted that a male child Born to the Israelites would lead the slaves to freedom
ReplyI scrolled down to the comments section just to make sure people caught this error... I usually don't care about little errors on Cracked, but this one completely changed the meaning of the story.
Gotta give the author half credit on this one. Pharaoh issued the command, but initially commanded the Hebrew midwives to do the actual killing. When the midwives made excuses to get out of that, the command was issued to everyone. So really, the babies had to be hidden from both the Egyptians and the subjugated Israelites.
Baby Moses was hidden from the Egyptians, not the Israelites. Just sayin'...
ReplyMy dad smoked when I was a kid, he just quit this year. I used to HATE IT with a passion. Then my parents decided to place me in a private school for high school (Where I s**t you not) 90% of the student body smoked and they even had 8 minute breaks between classes so the students could go outside to smoke. By my second year there, I was a regular smoker (at age 16) not because of peer pressure, in fact I was informed regularly by the kids that smoked not to smoke. That and no one ever offered me a cigarette, EVER, I ended up having to steal from my dad to get my first cigarette. I started smoking at 16 and still smoke 11 years later. Yet my parents didn't put up much of a fight over me smoking, they just said I had to go outside because that's what my dad had to do. Hell, for the two years I was underage my dad bought me cigarettes.
ReplyAs for DARE, we did that program in 6th grade. For a week that's all we did, stupid peer pressure related activities. By 11th grade I was smoking pot every day on my lunch break during school. I still smoke pot to this day just WAY less than I did in high school cause frankly weed is not worse than alcohol and that s**t is legal. Oh and for two years of my life I was addicted to LEGAL prescription drugs (narcotics) because lets face it, barbituates a fuggin awesome.
tl;dr
This is a comment:
ReplyI thoroughly support the observational and research-ridden story that you so eloquently deposited at my feet and enjoy it immensely. Cracked has filled many hours of my life with insightful, thoughtful, meaningful, and dangerously funny stories that I have found myself quoting to those around me, usually starting with "I read a Cracked article that said..." or "There was this hilariously funny thing I read on Cracked that said..." and go from there. Thank you Cracked.
This is a comment on drugs:
I f*****g hate you you Commie bastards! You rape little children and then you suck and then DIE! I hate everything about you and your typos and think you should be anally raped until you DIE! I am a unicorn and that makes me RIGHT! Go f**k yourself Cracked! Shit. My mom's calling. I HATE YOU!
Any questions?
lol so true
"When are we going to figure out that even kids have bullshit detectors?"
ReplyI long for that day.
Same here. I don't think that'll ever happen, though.
DARE just seems pointless, because, at least when I was in school, they did the DARE program so ridiculously early...I remember being like 7 and I thinking that I would definitely never drink or smoke and wondering why anyone ever would...but by the time any of that stuff was actually an issue all the DARE stuff was a distant memory anyways.
ReplyThey told us in our dare program if we smoked weed we might overdose and die
My mother is a severe alcoholic, which meant I knew entirely too much about the subject. As a result, I corrected my DARE officer on quite a few "facts." I still remember seeing him gape at me, then try desperately to bullshit his way out of it. Ah, good times.
ReplyJust say no!
ReplyD.rugs A.re R.eally E.xpensive
In the fifth grade, me and two of my best friends won an award for a project we did in DARE, and one of my friends one a scholarship for a speech written for DARE. Well, we all smoke weed now. And drink heavily. They're college flunkies, too, so see where that scholarship went? damn DARE. And yes, I tried pot for the first time JUST BECAUSE "the man" was against it. Effective? No.
ReplyThey should have used this tactic below to discourage drug use:
Reply(_._) = This is your ass.
(_O_) = This is your ass after we throw you in prison for breaking drug laws.
ANY QUESTIONS?
Know what the problem is with DARE?
ReplyDidn't the last one technically succeed, since the person who started it wanted it to fail?
ReplySure did.