Public Service Messages or PSA’s are a public service advertisement. They are messages in the public interest disseminated by the media without charge, with the objective of raising awareness, changing public attitudes and behavior towards a social issue. In the UK, they are generally called Public Information films.
The earliest Public Service Announcements were made before and during the Second World War years in both the UK and the US. After the war, PSAs were generally used to educate the public on a broader range of important issues. The most common topics of PSAs are health and safety, such as the multimedia Emergency Preparedness & Safety Tips on Air and Online talk radio/blog campaign. A typical PSA is part of a public awareness campaign to inform or educate the public about an issue such as obesity or compulsive gambling. The range of possible topics has expanded over time and has expanded its focus to address issues such as forest fires, blood donations and highway safety.
On the popular blog site Cheezburger.com they have posted to the site a PSA segment titled, PSA: Don’t Skip School, Kids! The posting is a YouTube video link provided by The Learn for Life Foundation. The scene is set as a group of teenage school friends ditch the day and pile into an old model VW van and head down for the shore. They slip through a hole in the fence and make their way onto the beach with ease. It was a seemingly beautiful school free day on the beach in Australia. There is a mixture of surf and sand, as the youthful glow of the kids frolic in the day.
Until the unthinkable happens to them, the crisp sand turns into the enemy. As the kids run along the beach they realize, too late, that they have ignored the barbed wire warnings and entered into an explosives testing area. This is what happens when you slack off. Stay in school, the PSA warns. This video is NSFW, so please watch at your own discretion.
Image Credit: www.adrants.com