New Anti-Drug Campaign Thinks Emojis Will Finally Get Teens To Listen

Eyeballs, the number one, ant, peace sign, flexing arm, inbox, peach. To ;anyone not fluent in emoji, that might be how you read the first line of the new anti-drug ;ad seen above. It was rolled out last week as part of campaign from the Partnership for Drug-Free Kids, a national nonprofit that relies on federal drug-prevention education grants and private funding, including from pharmaceutical companies. The ads will make use of $8 million worth of outdoor space, according to AdWeek, which includes a large billboard in Times Square featuring the image above. It translates to, “I want to fit in, …

Eyeballs, the number one, ant, peace sign, flexing arm, inbox, peach.

To ;anyone not fluent in emoji, that might be how you read the first line of the new anti-drug ;ad seen above. It was rolled out last week as part of campaign from the Partnership for Drug-Free Kids, a national nonprofit that relies on federal drug-prevention education grants and private funding, including from pharmaceutical companies.

The ads will make use of $8 million worth of outdoor space, according to AdWeek, which includes a large billboard in Times Square featuring the image above. It translates to, “I want to fit in, but I don’t want to smoke.”

The Partnership, along with ad agency Hill Holliday — which created the emoji-based campaign pro bono — are operating on the belief ;that emoji has become the de facto language ;of the ever-perplexing teen. Naturally, then, young people will be receptive to having adults appropriate their pop culture in order to engage them in a conversation about a drug-free lifestyle. Teens love it when adults do that, and anti-drug groups have been trying to master the art of this sort of pandering for decades. Just look at this super cool ad from 1988 created by Partnership for a Drug-Free America, a predecessor to Partnership for Drug-Free Kids.

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The billboards are just part of the Partnership’s ;#WeGotYou campaign. Its site is only accessible on mobile devices (apparently teens don’t use computers anymore), and provides support on a variety of topics, including sex, bullying and self-image.

But the campaign’s broader goals seem unavoidably overshadowed by the emoji theme — at least from my non-teen perspective. Sections are headlined by large text challenging users to “get emojinal” by cracking cryptic codes that, if you’re a fluent emoji user, serve as simple words of encouragement. “I don’t have to be wasted to have fun,” reads one string of tiny pictures that includes a donut, a bee and a bunch of fractions.

While #WeGotYou is well-intentioned, and even succeeds in not resorting to blatant fear-mongering or condescension, it still comes off as another desperate attempt to make the traditionally uncool message of abstinence seem hip ;– or fly, or dope, or whatever the kids are calling it these days. In other words, it’s simply trying too hard. Trying too hard is lame, and if anybody can tell when someone is trying too hard, it’s teenagers.

Look, we get it: Teens are confusing and emojis are totally in right now. But let’s not sell them so short. Sure, they’re obsessed with Snapchat and having their emoticon game on fleek and all sorts of things we don’t fully understand, but they’re still humans, and there’s nothing they understand better than actual words. Spending millions of dollars trying to rebrand a failed abstinence-only message ;is simply an expensive gimmick, and one that most teens will likely see through. Communicating like teens is not the same thing as communicating with them.

Maybe we should instead be reconsidering the message we’re trying to send, not just the mode of communication. Groups like the Drug Police Alliance, a nonprofit that advocates for progressive reform of drug laws, have long championed a form of ;drug prevention education ;that puts forth abstinence as the first, though not only, path to success. They also encourage sophisticated discussions about the difference between drug use and abuse, giving science-based information about various drugs, and ;prioritizing personal responsibility as a way to improve safety.

Of course, this would require a more nuanced view of drugs and drug policy — and certainly one that believes honest words, not emojis, are the best way to engage young people in these difficult conversations.

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New Anti-Drug Campaign Thinks Emojis Will Finally Get Teens To Listen