"I'm not going to air something that's going to stereotype our communities in a negative way," says Lucia Madrid, the station's vice president for community relations, explaining why a pitch like Evanston's anti-gang PSA might not pass muster. However, trying to put a positive spin on a negative problem can result in a frivolous message, as the Evanston Human Relations Council found in its second PSA.
Similarly, in 1993, the Phoenix chapter of Mothers Against Gangs produced
Spanish- and English-language anti-gang PSAs
aimed at preteens. In the spots an adult Hispanic thrashes his arms about while stiffly mouthing bad rap rhymes. The result is laughably unsophisticated.
Brian Stauffer
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"It only showed dancing," says MAG's Sophia Lopez-Espindola. "It didn't really show the effects of what gangs can do, and that's what I think they need to show. Although it's hard to see a dead body there, people actually need to see that. And the kids, this is what's going to happen to you."
In the end the PSAs' ineffectiveness was moot, because they only aired about 2 in the morning, Lopez says, rather than at a time when kids might actually watch them.
"Obviously, if you had the same kind of budget that the tobacco companies have, you could probably have a very similar impact," says Captain Mike Orose of G.I.T.E.M., the Department of Public Safety's gang task force.
There are PSAs aimed at a larger group of troubled young people, not just those who might join gangs.
The Phoenix Suns, for example, are preparing a new PSA to publicize their Nite Hoops program, which enlists young adult parolees in a program that combines citizenship and parenting and job-hunting classes with a basketball league and trips to pro games. The Suns will likely have the clout to get their spots aired during prime time.
The National Crime Prevention Council together with the National Ad Council has put together remarkably sophisticated PSAs both to appeal to kids and to shock them.
For example, one spot, while talking about gangsters and crackheads, depicts a group of "fringey" kids with tattoos and frowning faces. Then it turns the tables to say that these are good kids trying to reform bad kids. The positive parting message: "
Judge us by what we do, not by how we look
."
Another shows a chilling montage of child gunshot victims, funerals, mourning relatives and actual footage of youths chasing each other down city streets while firing handguns. A sweet gospel soprano sings "
Where have all the children gone
," to Bob Dylan's timeless "Blowing in the Wind."
"I do peace treaties [with gangs] all over the country," says Jerel Eaglin, director of youth services for the Washington, D.C.-based National Crime Prevention Council.
"Almost 80 percent of gang members want out," he contends.
Eaglin claims to be a former gang member himself. He also goes by the Muslim name of Muata Kiongozi, and he travels the country making inspirational speeches about gangs and gang problems.
Despite the MTV views of "gangsta paradise," it's really a life of gangsta hell.
"The moment you sign up, you have signed your death warrant," he says.
Gangsters live in a constant state of posttraumatic stress, watching their backs, waiting to get whacked. And unlike the posttraumatic stress suffered by soldiers, there's no going home, no getting off the plane and kissing the ground.
"I got kids planning their funerals," Eaglin says.
And so his solution for anti-gang advertising is simple, but dramatic.
"What I'd like to see on TV, is 'How Do You Get Out?'" he says.
Merely telling kids to stay away from gangs -- or anything else -- is futile. Push too hard, and you drive them toward exactly what you're telling them to avoid.
Eaglin cautions that any anti-gang message needs "aftercare programs." Like the Suns PSA, it has to be tied to something meaningful.
Media alone can't do it. If you tell a gangster to stop being a gangster, you have to provide an option, a place to go instead of the street, a job, an education, a viable way out.
Read more stories in the Hard Core series.
Contact Michael Kiefer at his online address: mkiefer@newtimes.com
