So on Saturday it’s Earth Hour.
In a very short period of time, it’s become an established ‘event’ and given the tragic situation going on in Japan at the moment, it’s possibly going to be even more relevant this year than before.
But is it actually doing anything?
I don’t want to piss on it because any positive effect is a good effect, but my issue is that awareness isn’t the problem, it’s sustained behavioural change that’s needed and getting people to switch stuff off for a single hour a year just isn’t creating the cultural shift that’s needed on a long-term level.
What’s the answer?
Well that’s where I’m a fucking ass because I haven’t got one, but with no significant slow down of environmental change and an ever-increasing demand for various forms of energy, something drastic is going to have to happen because if people think they are making a major difference by turning their lights off for 60 minutes – out of a possible 525,000 plus minutes per year – then they are seriously deluded.
As I said, I don’t want to totally piss on it because [1] it’s made a statement and [2] it was allegedly created by an ad agency however as I’ve always contended, awareness doesn’t count for much if it doesn’t motivate the change in behaviour that’s called on which is why in an effectiveness award, I’d be more inclined to say it failed than passed.
Am I harsh?
Maybe … but the issue I’ve had with adland is that they are far too happy just ‘advertising the problem’ when what we should be doing – if only to justify our fees’ – is to try and ‘change the outcome’.
Now of course that is much harder to do, but I know there are a bunch of awesome brains in this industry who could/do come up with stuff that can genuinely create change rather than just create ads however until we stop going for the path of least resistance [or should I say easier fee justification, even though my approach is actually more profitable because you can charge a royalty for the idea as well as the usual fees to make the communication that promotes the idea] we will continue to be viewed as the cockroaches of commerce, and that bothers me a lot because done correctly, we can make a much bigger difference to people and society than many other industries.
But back to the point.
I think the people at Earth Hour have come to the same conclusion as me that to make a major difference, they need to make people change their attitudes longterm, not just their house lighting for one hour.
And why do I think that, because this is their new ‘logo’ …
Yep, they’ve added a fucking ‘+’ sign.
A FUCKING PLUS SIGN!
Oh yes, that’ll do it … global attitudinal change all by adding a simple symbol.
Maybe it’s just me, but I think that completely and utterly undermines their cred.
It’s lazy, cheap and fails to credit the global population with any sense of intelligence.
The thing is, they could have done it differently.
They’re called EARTH HOUR, not ANNUAL EARTH HOUR so they could simply have created more events throughout the year to encourage a longer-term change in attitude and behaviour.
OK, so the cost of promoting that might be high, but there are other ways from consecutive Earth Hour’s – say 8pm, 9pm, 10pm – to simply making 8pm every Saturday a ‘lights out’ period, but to be honest there are a whole bunch of other methods that are way more likely to instigate change than putting a ‘+ sign’ on a fucking ad.
While any change is positive, we should always be focused on trying to achieve the ultimate goal and if we’re satisfied by simply raising awareness [though there are occasions when that is all that is needed, but certainly not as often as that ‘rationale’ is used by certain agencies and companies] or a momentary change of behaviour, then I think we’re selling ourselves short and not showing how brilliant – and collaborative – we can be.