Where are the Messages Against Alcohol-Fuelled Violence?
With increasing numbers of ‘King hit’ stories making headlines Dr David Waller asks whether alcohol awareness advertising in Australia is powerful enough, and why there are no anti-violence messages.
Another weekend and another cowardly ‘king hit’ has resulted in a young person on life-support. Alcohol-fuelled violence has been a topic of discussion on television news shows and radio talkback, particularly since the death of Thomas Kelly in July 2012.
Several suggestions have been raised including restricting opening hours, lockouts after a certain time, raising the price of alcohol and entry fees to venues, as well as increasing police patrols, higher prison terms, and mandatory sentencing for killer punches.
While there is outrage in the community, the police force, and the media, the politicians are reluctant to make significant changes and little seems to have been done.
Despite being a hot topic of discussion it is noticeable that there is no obvious advertising campaign at the moment that warns people about binge drinking and the dangers of coward punches.
Recent Campaigns
Waller
Over the last few years there have been a few social marketing campaigns that have focused on alcohol-related issues, like “If you drink and drive, than you’re a bloody idiot!” and “Don’t turn a night out into a nightmare”.
Two of the more recent campaigns are: the Drinkwise campaign “Drink Cycle” which reflects that drinking habits are passed on to the next generation, which supports the ‘drinking culture’ argument in Australia – although I don’t recall the same level of violence associated with drinking when I was growing up; and the RTA’s Mobile RBT campaign, which basically warns people about getting caught drink driving. Neither are particularly strong messages.
Drink Cycle:
RTA Mobile RBT:
There have also been campaigns targeting teens such as “Drinking. Where are your choices taking you?”, which aims to shame teenagers not to binge drink as there are bad consequences.
Interestingly one of the comments on the Youtube page states: “looks like a pro-drinking ad to me?”. A few years ago I went to the cinema and a similar ad was shown before the movie and it was cheered by some of the young people in the audience. Unfortunately, the message did not seem to be getting through.
Is shaming young people the best way to send an anti-binge drinking message?
According to a US study in 2010, using shame and guilt to reduce binge drinking may not work as those targeted “already feeling some level of guilt or shame instinctively resist messages that rely on those emotions, and in some cases are more likely to participate in the behavior they’re being warned about.”*
So aiming to shame people who may already be feeling ashamed about their behaviour may not be the best message for anti-alcohol ads.
International Examples
In many countries there have been campaigns to reduce drink driving and binge drinking. Below are a few I would like to highlight as they clearly get a message across and do not use personal shame as the motivator to change behaviour.
In New Zealand there have been some excellent campaigns. These include:
“Legend” which uses humour to ‘stop a mate driving drunk’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIYvD9DI1ZA
“Mate” is an emotional ad that cleverly plays on mateship and the results of drink driving
“Let’s Go See Daddy” was an interesting campaign that targets women for the drink driving message. While there have been a few cases of women arrested for high range drink driving with children in the car, this issue is largely ignored in Australia.
Finally, from the UK in 2008 there was a anti-binge drinking campaign aimed at both males and females with the message: “You wouldn’t start a night like this, so why end it that way?”. These ads were also shown in schools to discuss the issue of binge drinking.
Boy’s Night Out:
Girl’s Night Out:
Clearly, Australia seems well behind in sending a message about binge drinking. Also there powerful forces that do not want significant changes in the drinking status quo, or are afraid of offending alcohol brand sponsors. Such as when Cricket Australia refused a slogan from the public health group Healthway: “Alcohol – think again. Alcohol and sport don’t mix.”
With it being such a big social problem at the moment, where are the anti-alcohol fuelled violence ads in Australia?
While this is not a problem that can be solved easily, particularly when there is little political will to do so, and it certainly will not be solved by an advertising campaign, there should be an attempt to get the message out to educate people that alcohol–fuelled violence, and particularly a coward punch, is wrong and can be deadly. Otherwise, the tally of young people on life support each weekend will continue to grow.
Dr David Waller is a senior lecturer in the marketing disciplines group at the University of Technology, Sydney.
*Full study is Agrawal, N., & Duhachek, A. (2010). Emotional compatibility and the effectiveness of antidrinking messages: A defensive processing perspective on shame and guilt. Journal of Marketing Research, 47(2), 263-273.
Ubiquitous alcohol advertising maybe a cause but the sentencing in Australia is way too low for these kinds of crimes.
4 1/2 years for Thomas Kelly’s killing has sent a strong message: you will get away with it.
This should have been prosecuted as murder with an appropriate minimum term of 17-25 years.
A NRL player was sent to prison for only 2 years yesterday for a stomping and both prosecutors and defence seemed surprised at the Magistrate – er what? Make it 4 years and then we’re in the ballpark.
It’s the same on “RBT” – the police always seem to console people that they’re at the “lower end” of the scale as if that is ok and the minimum sentences don’t deter.
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Great article. From a social point of view, I always find it irritating that if you aren’t drinking alcohol you have to give an excuse as to why not. It shows a great lack of acceptance for abstinence, surely that’s something that could change!
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This is a tough area to get actual behaviour change, I reckon, partly because the person is so irrational and disinhibited when drunk that even if they are in fact impacted by an ad, they are unlikely to be influenced by it when under the influence. And because some level of alcohol consumption is socially acceptable (even approved of/required within the peer group) it’s hard to draw a clear line between “good” and “bad” consumption behaviour when framing a communication message without be dismissed as paternalistic and irrelevant.
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I would hazard a guess that these idiots who do this are pissed before they even get to Kings Cross or wherever they go. The argument appears to be to restrict them alcohol and lock them out of nightclubs. But if they started drinking at home at lunchtime before wandering in to wherever it is they go to cause havoc, I’m not sure how anyone can police against that. If you look at a lot of these ‘king hits’ they were done well before midnight. Sadly, there’s a lot of dumb, mindless neanderthals in our community and I’m not sure how you legislate against that. And the problem of violence is not just restricted to ‘entertainment areas’. Take Sydney at the moment, there’s gang warfare, daily shootings in the west, not to mention the violence the article talks about. We’re have a surging problem with young male violence full-stop. It’s deluded machismo and a huge societal problem.
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Young people are impressionable and what they really need is for advertising to give them an excuse which would be perceived by friends as a socially acceptable reason to not binge drink.
The NZ ads provides youth with a comedic way out of drinking in excess in social situations. Where friends may pressure others to drink more, being able to ‘share’ and quote these ads allows youth to escape the social pressures to binge drink.
Humour appeals and quotable script (“ghost chips!”) is the way to go for this demographic.
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It will not be certainly not be solved by an advertising campaign and there’s little political will do do anything – are the takeouts from this very good piece. This is our version of America’s gun problem. What chance do we have when, a day after the last deadly incident, Bob Hawke appears at the cricket sculling a beer to impress the crowd?
Tim Riches makes a salient point about drunk people not recalling advertising messages. This is a problem that needs a big idea, but not what advertising calls a big idea (date on a pillow, name on a can pffft!).
Unfortunately this government will never back a big idea -especially involving the Alcohol lobby. It’s just not in their nature to change anything – unless it’s changing it back.
There’s a scene in the Simpsons where Marge tells Homer his car needs a wash – and he ignores her. Then Lennie pulls along side and says the same thing. Homer instantly drives into a car-wash. If this problem is to be solved it will only be solved by the binge drinking community themselves.
Good luck with that.
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It ain’t the booze, it’s the violence.
Booze doesn’t help, but it is the credo of punching that is wrong.
Plenty of people get drunk but do not lash out at strangers.
Anger, lack of control, poor anger management – all get worse with alcohol, but to focus solely on alcohol misses the main problem.
I would bet there is a very common thread binding the perps of violence; low education, impoverished homelife, ineffective male role models, a lack of understanding of consequences.very likely low-paid jobs, low-esteem careers.
In short, losers.
There’s a good chance they were bullies or bullied at school. Because once violence is a currency, it will get spent.
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We cannot just blame the licensed venues for all that is happening on the streets of NSW. Nor can we continue to excuse the teenagers and young adults (sic) excessive consumption of alcohol leading to this risk taking behaviour because they are young. The Venues and their staff as they are having to deal with persons who pre- charging to a point that keeps them just below intoxication (not easily recognised) and very early in the evening. Irresponsible consumption is the real culprit here and the community is crying out “What can we do?”
Let’s look at the fines:
Are they being applied to Venues and their staff serving irresponsible? NO!, Are supermarkets selling to underage being fined? NO! Are Parents who are supplying their kids and kids friends with alcohol under the mistaken belief that its legal for them to do so because they are the legal guardians being fined? NO! There may be a defense to the fines in a court of law but the Liquor Act states that it is illegal to supply or sell alcohol to a minor . So let’s apply the $1100 Penalty and/or the $1100 fine and see if this stops.
Will education help? Yes but it to need to be examined more closely.
Let’s look at the current training. Current arguments are blaming the recent online course supplied by NSW OLGR.
Yes OLGR got the online wrong. Only experienced workers renewing their RSA Certification should be allowed to undertake the online course. New staff entering the industry for the firsts time or after al long absence should have to undertake the face-to face course. Its basic commonsense. Commonsense suggest that this rule may need to be varied for country areas due to logistics and the tyranny of distance. But new entry country staff should be restricted to working shifts where they are strictly supervised by experienced staff and the Licensee for 6 months or more.
OLGR should go back to the rule that all RSA & RCG (Responsible Conduct of Gaming) trainers are OLGR approved and not just leave it to the RTO to deem their trainers as competent to deliver an assess. You are only going to gain good knowledge from good Industry training.
Interstate Registered Training Organisations (RTO’s) are supplying the NSW students with cut price course with short answer exams that do not cover the full Responsible Service of Alcohol competency unit nor the NSW OLGR online course. NSW OLGR has matched the course to the unit and the NSW Industry. NSW OLGR supplies the exact same online course to all RTO’s so it has to be the way it is delivered and assessed by the RTO’s. If these RTO’s are not doing it right then lets lock them out of the delivery and assessment processes until they do it right.
Mandatory RSA & RCG training in High School to all students would be an excellent start with regards to responsible consumption of alcohol and the pitfalls of gambling. Course for school students should be delivered by NSW OLGR approved Trainers who have long term experience working in hospitality and who currently undertake RSA & RCG delivery and assessments for Registered Training Organisations. Not by High School teachers who in most cases have no recent experience at the coal face of hospitality or in this type of course delivery and assessment.
This training would need to emphasis the dangers to self and others of irresponsible alcohol consumption, and gambling, how to resist peer pressure and to look after your mate if they do drink/gamble, how to recognise the dangers, the fines that apply to minors for entering a restricted area in a licensed premises, consuming alcohol, for intoxication and for supplying to minors rather than the service of alcohol or gaming but it would be a good start.
The police need to be funded and allowed to be proactive rather than reactive as they are forced to be now. Police should be encouraged to apply penalties to both patrons and venues/staff. Fines should be made Mandatory so that the Courts have to follow through and issue the maximum mandatory fines and prison sentences to those who fail to comply. Its working with the drink driving laws and will work here if they are made to….
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