Shock Campaign

12 December 2009. Chartres, France. 

Apparently Chartres has a serious driving-and-texting problem.  Last December, before any snow hit, the city set up  a little exhibit demonstrating the effects of driving-and-texting: intense car accidents, blood, medical situations worse than death. The text in the sign reads: "Le telephone de Julie ne marchera plus. Julie non plus." Roughly translated, that means: "Julie's telephone doesn't work anymore. Julie doesn't either."

Eeerily reminds me of a perhaps too-morbid smoke-detector campaign ad I created in 4th grade. This one's more bloody, though.


The town is rather blatantly trying to mold its citizens train of thought, much the same way that MJs keep-Paris-clean-campaign-theory works.  I haven't seen any indicator here that driving and texting may be illegal. Contrasted with the fact that the US first told people that it was illegal, then applied to their reason (via New York Times driving/texting game), our differing ad campaigns highlight exactly how big government is here compared to there.  How big? Big enough that instead of being advertised, it's internalized.  Gulp.