12 Frosty Pigs

"We used to have a lot of the disturbing-death style anti-drink driving/speeding ads, but they were apparently losing their effectiveness as people got used to them. Thus, they've shifted to another approach.

Or so I've heard."

In the New Zealand Media a new approach has been taken to portray the importance of drug-driving in Aotearoa. The humorous '12 Frosty Pigs' Advertisement adresses the seriousness of driving under the influence of drugs. In the beginning of the ad an elderly kiwi couple are shown working in their bakery, a middle aged Indian man and his brother are shown outside their convenience store and lastly a slightly elder Asian couple working in a fish and chip shop. The Asian lady working in the fish and chip shop states, "People come in and by food, I know they smoking the naughty cigarette and take long time to order." The lady then continues "I say, you too slow,you have a crispy duck, sit down!" This representation shows New Zealanders as slow, inadequate and in general, thick. The way the lady instructs the 'stoned' person to sit down is in a sarcastic but aggressive way that would make one feel inferior to her because of their drug influence. This representation makes viewers believe these people cannot think for themselves, they will be delayed in their responses and that it is just easier to decide for them. The elderly couple who own the bakery are shown in the next scene reciting all the names they can think of that is used to describe Marijuana. The elder man suggests "Weed, pot, Northland green or New Zealand green, yeah they buy heaps thats for real (laughs)" Then his wife asks "What about that young guy the other day?" to which he responds "He was a bit slow that fellow." They show camera footage from in the store of the 'young guy' walking in and looking at what he would like to buy. The guy is approximately in his twenties, dressed in shorts, a checkered shirt, scruffy hair, the New Zealand typical male stereotype very similar to the young guy who is told off in the fish and chip shop. This scene again reinforcing how society sees drug users, not just in terms of drug-driving but participating in general day by day life.

In the next scene the Indian man talks about two males laughing about the soap in his convenience store, he says "My soap is not funny..at all." The creators of this advertisement have created video footage in each store of people under the influence of drugs coming into their store and having abnormal behaviour especially for the age they are. It is very carefully put together in that the acting owners of the stores are of mixed race in New Zealands society but the drug users are only seen to be kiwis of between 20-25 years of age and 3 out of 4 of them were male. This changes the view of New Zealand males once again, stereotyping them to be the more common drug users or drug-drivers. The advertisement itself shows the wider implications of drug-driving as the actors are judging and making assumptions of these people themselves.

This advertisement along side the 'Blazed' ad, are the new approach to humour in the advertising of drug-driving in New Zealand. The older New Zealand ads used shock, images of car accidents, injured people, shattered glass and loud screeching sounds. Although this was effective in that the viewers felt alarmed, threatened and ideally would be scared away from drug-driving, clearly this wasn't effective enough. As explained in this "We used to have a lot of the disturbing-death style anti-drink driving/speeding ads, but they were apparently losing their effectiveness as people got used to them. Thus, they've shifted to another approach.

Or so I've heard."

 New Zealanders respond more to humour than to horror and although this can be seen as naive and insensitive, I personally think its due to the way these advertisements can be spoken about, discussed with friends and family as opposed to the terrifying advertisements that are not appropriate to discuss.

http://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/1mfco0/hilarious_antidrug_driving_advert_in_new_zealand/

 In the New Zealand advertisement 'Blazed', New Zealand Māori's are portrayed as drug users. The advertisement shows three young Māori boys of roughly ten years of age imitating their fathers driving when they've "Been blazing". The advert is shown in black and white and the young boys are seen sitting in a parked car. The camera shows the young boys through the windows of the car, front windscreen and the two front seat windows at a medium close-up angle. The eldest looking boy is dressed in a collared shirt and is seen in the beginning of the ad at a low angle shot, empowering him as he argues with another boy about their fathers 'burnouts'. The boys are seen to be' competing with each other on whose dad smokes more Marijuana and whose dad also does the 'best burnouts'. One of the young boys states  "My dad is the best-est a driver, even when he has been blazing." This is encouraging the stereotype that drug-driving is an acceptable form of behaviour and also from another perspective that drug-driving with children in the vehicle is also acceptable. 

During the ad the boys make several comments about the driving, such as, "I’m going [inaudible] an hour. That’s too fast. That’s too fast. Take the wheel from my – I am freaking out." This is an extremely powerful representation to all New Zealanders and also people all over the world watching this advertisement that in New Zealand it is 'ok' to drug-drive and this quote heavily implies the parents making the young children drive, making it clear to their children that they are not in a fit state to drive and also when the boy says 'I'm freaking out' it makes the viewer wonder why this person thinks that it is acceptable for them to drive putting not only themselves and everyone else on the road at risk but also their young children. 

The younger generation is then taught that it is okay to drive no matter what influences you're under and that nobody is expected to be the 'sober driver' like encouraged in drink driving adverts. "The idea for the ad came from an insight shared by Maori dads, according to Clemenger BBDO. “They don't like smoking weed around their children. And yet they have no problem driving with their kids in the car after a session,” says the campaign background document." This ad generates a lot of misleading thought to New Zealand viewers too, the ad is crafted in a very humorous way so the viewers laugh along with the way these young children are acting and then, hopefully, catch themselves doing so and question their personal morals and how wrong it is that such young children are experiencing this kind of behaviour, being put in these kinds of situations and also how many people are drug-driving and getting away with it. This advertisement represents New Zealand Māori's as irresponsible and for viewers who don't live in New Zealand and aren't aware that it is not a cultural behaviour, it creates a very negative light on the Māori people. This campaigner wrote about the statistics of this "Research from the last New Zealand Alcohol and Drug Use Survey found that Maori men and women were over 50 percent more likely to have used cannabis in the previous year than men and women in the general population. So while this campaign is targeting a broad New Zealand audience, it will also specifically be targeting Maori through a separate TV ad and programme integration deliberately developed for Maori, via Maori TV." 
They put these stereotypes to use so that the advert is a conversational point and to create friction between the people discussed in the hopes that they will change their behaviour. Being a catchy advert it is wider spread and discussed by more than just the people who have seen the ad itself.