Braille Burgers

Fast-food chain Wimpy spelt out messages on its buns in braille to let blind and visually-impaired people know they were welcome any time. Nice idea, and nice film too. Video after the jump.

What you’re really doing when you park in a handicapped spot

Crude, but effective. I hope it’s real, and not just award bait. If there’s one place public shaming is needed in social marketing, it’s calling out people whose selfishness hurts others.

Related posts:
- Wheelchair Guerilla
- I’m a asshole and I park wherever I please
- So I choose
- Go and break your fucking spine

WHEN HANDICAPS BRING THE NORM INTO QUESTION!

Here is a very unique project. Watever emotions it’ll generate, it can’t leave you cold.
This project is an amazing documentary ( I can’t say about handicap question because it would be too much simplistic) named « Mirror of my soul ».

All you have to do is browse through the literature pertaining to handicaps (the various attempts to define the term, the numerous denominations, and even the recent laws regarding the topic) to understand that handicaps are still a major social issue. Despite heightened awareness and legal measures, handicaps continue to be a cause of social exclusion; and this with regards to education, access to facilities, professional integration, but first and foremost to social acceptance.

A central theme in Mirror of my soul, a tenderly and modestly filmed documentary, is making people aware that the way some look at those who are handicapped is sometimes harder to take than the handicap itself.
It is thus essential to instruct people on how to see handicaps. This documentary goes in search of some souls.

Unrequited Object of Desire

Nice piece of guerilla advertising shown in the Shopping ABC, Santo André, Brasil on the days before Valentine’s Day.
Its is made by Fischer&Friends for AACD (Associação de Assistência à Criança Deficiente / Association for Assistance to Disabled Children) to raise funds.
Over 30.000 children are waiting for receiving care. It is about a wheelchair, prosthesis or a pair of crutches.

In the mall artist and illustrator Francisco Martins painted a declaration of love on the floor. The text is about an unrequited love. At the end of the declaration a wheelchair was parked.
On the wheelchair this text was written:
“There are thousands of people waiting for wheelchairs, crutches and prostheses.
Help the AACD to make the queue shorter.”

Related AACD posts:
- 404 pages can return much more than an error
- Unique Types

Do We Have to Dress Up to Become Closer?

Buzzfeed offers the translation of this ad’s message as “Do We Have to Dress Up to Become Closer?”, but I don’t think you need any translation to get this moving PSA’s point about being more welcoming of people with differences.

Making Of (in German) after the break.

Wheelchair Guerilla

Great guerilla action in Curitiba Brazil. I don’t know much about this specific action done by Bruno Siqueira but it’s obvious what is happening here.
It is the world upside down from disabled people daily life experiences.

The most obvious excuse “I’m parking here only for one minute” is written on the note on the back of the wheelchair.

In Greece they said it in less subtile way a few years ago.
And also in Belgium in 2006.
Or place a sign with “go and break your fucking spine”.

(thx 2525)

Update: Bruno Siqueira send us the English version:

Encourage Omar

Encouragement. Strength. Sport. All are values worth mentioning but even more so when addressed to people with disabilities. Omar Haddad is a Special Olympics athlete that receives our encouragement on the aural experience, by raising the volume bar and cheering up the young hero.

At www.encourageomar.co.uk the charity efforts of Special Olympics Great Britain show how to transform and be transformed by one’s positive support. Video after the break, but you should really check the website for the full experience.

Save electricity, hire a blind person

Three times fun from the The Norwegian Association of the Blind (Norges Blindeforbund).

In Norway there are blind and visually impaired people in about 100 different occupations, but many are struggling to get a job.
The Blindeforbund want to focus on that blind and visually impaired can be consultants, journalists, computer experts, mechanics or farmers and hopes that employers will perceive how well workers can be visually impaired.

Some things become Safe For Work with a blind person at the office.
And for you: two Less Safe For Work videos after the break.

Related post: Norwegian Association of the Blind: Don’t Disturb the ones working.

Pearls of Wisdom

Lovely campaign from Jewish Care here in the UK – collecting ‘pearls of wisdom’ from older people in the Jewish community. What I love about this is the promotion of the charity’s community and mission, paired with fundraising, awareness and social change. It’s not marketing – it’s what they do. Pearls

Lovely video after the jump.

Just Two Minutes

This great mini-film for Quebec’s MEMO (Moelle épinière et motricité Québec) is actually closer to the four-minute mark,  but well worth a watch. It shows, in painful real time, the inconvenience and hazard caused by a selfish and thoughless able-bodied couple who illegally park in a handicapped spot “just for two minutes” as they pick up some building supplies from Home Depot.

(Canadian viewers will get a kick — and perhaps a craving — out of the cameo by a Harvey’s hamburger joint.)

A nice piece of mini-film, and a great step in the evolution of PSAs from 30-second interruptions on television to on-demand “advertainment” videos that are worthy of being passed around.

As straightforward as this video is (I could follow it, even with my pathetic high school French), it has really got me thinking about the future of PSAs. For that reason, I was inspired to cross post with my personal social issues marketing blog, Work That Matters. You can read the rest there.