These ads have just started popping up on campus billboards and transit lines across BC, apparently with the aim of encouraging young people to get a job. It seems like a waste of space to list all that is wrong with these (here is an example), but in spite of the free publicity these negatively-received ads are getting (guilty as charged), I’d just like to know how criticism and sarcasm is ever taken as positive encouragement? This is clearly an important issue and the campaign has obviously missed the mark.

Comments

BrainDrainXPOctober 18, 2012
You’re just upset at the ad that stated “Writing a Blog isn’t a real job.”
Hannah WiseOctober 18, 2012
Touché – I hadn’t seen that one! However, not being a member of the target market I still don’t see why youth or young adults would connect and respond positively to the campaign.
LindsayOctober 18, 2012
Ha ha to BrainDrainXP. But I have to agree with the post. Furthermore I’m not sure a BC gov’t ministry should be trading on anxiety around jobs here, especially considering that under the 11 years of the current sitting BC “Liberal” government we’ve seen the biggest spread of job loss and corporate outsourcing, the most rapid widening of the gap between rich and poor, and a little attempt at economic diversification beyond the traditional BC resource sector that by the way also dominates the political system here and hamstrings change. In that context these ads are even more egregious – I mean they go way beyond sarcasm. To a BC youth audience they are – or at least must read as – cynical. To get a sense of how BC youth feel… well, riots, anyone?
Skot NelsonOctober 21, 2012
I keep wondering if these were based on research. I don’t think much has really changed over the years about the youth population and jobs: a portion of youth have no interest in looking for the type of work they see their parents pursuing–they used to be slackers, then stoners, then anti-establishmentarianists, and now hipsters. Life will go on. Not everybody has to become a doctor, a lawyer or a teacher. Some will have multiple careers or jobs: working a subsistence job through the day to pursue their passion the rest of the time. Some will succeed wildly–becoming writers, musicians and artists–and some will fail miserably. Making fun of them isn’t going to help. That’s almost certain.
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