If you grew up anytime in the last five decades, you undoubtedly heard this message screamed at you from all those unfun authority figures in your life…. from your parents, teachers, Officer Friendly, and a talking crime dog. Of course, with all the peer pressures thrust upon us in our teen years, those adults may as well have been trying to speak in a Charlie Brown cartoon for all kids paid attention to them. After all, if your best friend (let’s call her Merby) were to offer you a hit off of her bong and says it’s totally cool and you won’t get in trouble for it, are you going to listen to someone who’s your age, or your prick of an algebra teacher who caught you reading comic books in class and made you stay after school?
The anti-drug organizations wanted to stop the cycle of drug addiction by discouraging children from ever even trying drugs. But they knew that kids weren’t going to pay much attention to the people they were actively rebelling against. So they decided to attack at the youth of America’s weak points, like in the arcades…
The Partnership for a Drug Free America bombarded kids’ programming with seemingly countless Public Service Announcements, each trying to scare kids about what bad things will happen to them if they use drugs, and parents about how they need to clean up their act and be role models for their children rather than recklessly dance on police cars.
So we were told our brains would end up sunny side up if we snorted some blow behind the bleachers…
Fathers were warned what might happen if little Tommy caught them shooting horse in the bedroom with some lady who wasn’t Mommy…
And we were generally shown just how much of a douchebag smoking dope can turn you into…
So many memorable ad campaigns, so may dollars down the drain trying to proactively keep kids from growing up and making their own meth lab. But there was one that always stuck with me… a great PSA that seemed lost to the dustbin of Just Say No history until I finally managed to dredge it up on YouTube this morning!
This ad has everything you need in a classic anti drug PSA!
Concerned parents… check!
Looks like it’s time for that uncomfortable family talk. You can tell they’re really parents because they look fucking old. Chances are, you never questioned how much older parents always looked compared to their children on TV if your folks had 30 or 40 years on you… but my Mom & Dad were both 20 when I was born, so I can’t relate to this wide generational chasm. They could just as easily both be sporting “World’s Greatest Grandparents” T-shirts from Mecca, though…
Oh, yeah, the potentially troubled kid…. check!
And you can tell he’s just one bad blunt away from turning into a rabblerousing crackhead. Note the backwards baseball cap and the flannel shirt… two sure signs you were dealing with a badass from the 90’s. If he got up from the couch, I’ll bet his Spiderman boxers would be showing above his saggy pants.
Parents about to do something supposedly hip to try to communicate with their spawn on his own level…. check!
Shit going to hell like a bad LSD trip? Check!!!
The dad’s tribute to Old School is almost as absurdly classic as the Crazy Calls rap. No really, this is great!
The wacky weed
It is bad
This I know
Believe your dad
Remember this
It’s your decision
But marijuana
Can lead to prison
Parents totally failing at being hip because they’re stuck in the wrong decade…. check!
We have to assume that after getting assaulted by this little family talk gone horribly wrong, that our troubled hero of this story packed up his Soundgarden albums and Kathy Ireland posters and ran the hell away from home. Together with his pot smoking buddy, he moved into a run down apartment in some back alley until he had finally done enough drugs to erase the memories of that horrendous bonding moment. The irony behind this ad is that it actually worked to keep kids away from drugs only because it was obvious the people who created it were under the influence of heavy hallucinogens and nobody wanted to be like those losers.
Knowledge is the anti-drug, and nostalgia is what we have to get our high from thanks to the killjoys who wanted to put Colombia out of business. So for the awesomest worst rap in television history, we at The Nest would like to salute the Partnership for a Drug Free America. You may not have cleaned up the mean streets of our country of every last bong and dirty needle, but you certainly gave us a lot of egg frying, empty swimming pool jumping laughs to distract us from the school dope dealer. Thanks to completely fucked up messages like these, we took steps in the 80’s to ensure a better future for America in the 21st Century….
Ah, the joys of bad advertising. The most interesting thing about it is that sometimes, it’ll actually encourage the kids to go out and try all this stuff!
Of course! They’re doing it on TV, so it must be cool!
For some unknown reason, I looked up the “Be an Original” video from the Just Say No campaign recently. I think the kid and his friends were mocking similar PSAs.
I had no problem with this myself. I learned from Arnold Drummond the consequences of not saying “no”.
Whatchu talkin’ ’bout, Willis?
In a Very Special Episode, Nancy Reagan visits Arnold’s school and shares the Power of Astrology.
My daughter frequently complains about all of the stoners at the high school. So one day I smell something funny. Her bedroom reeks of pot. It isn’t her. It wasn’t me. Then we realize it is the senior citizens next door. Holy possum crap. This is grandpa on dope.
Hard to believe, but the hippie generation is all in their 60’s! Far out…
What they should have done was taught us about using things in moderation and personal responsibility and how getting behind the wheel of a vehicle while fucked up on anything is a bad idea.
But it’s so much more authoritarian to slap someone on the hand and say “NO!” Thou shalt not, and all that good stuff…..
Aw, best friends are so like, totally awesome.
Um…those ads sucked…I learned it by watching you, dad. Classic.
You hath inspired me to do my own anit drug propaganda post!
Goodie! And this time, don’t delete it before I can see it in all it’s glory! 😉
Okays. 😉
Grandpa? Is that you?
Fo’ shizzle.
Like another commenter above, I smell pot and assume it’s the kids next door. But NO it’s the oldsters across the way having a little something-something. At 6:30 a.m. On a weekday morning. Flip city, daddy-o.
I guess marijuana is the new Geritol!
Made me laugh on that one! So it is.
I don’t remember any anti-drug adverts when I was a kid. Maybe I was too stoned to switch the TV on 🙂
Well, when you’re stoned, the hallucinations are all you need to watch!