Kids are willing to tell uncomfortable truths. Political campaigns tend to be very serious.
Amsterdam agency, Dancing Fox, has put these two facts together to create a campaign for the Greens/EFA Group, #TruthNeedsFriends, that makes the case for protecting truth tellers or whistleblowers in a strikingly new way. The video, which was produced in 15 different languages, aims “to break out of the “policy-wonk” bubble in Brussels and reach far more people than before,” the Greens/EFA Group noted.
Whistleblowers have an unpleasant history of being fired, demoted, harassed, or sued by their employers in order to keep them quiet.
“This may be the first time a political group in the European Parliament has tried to win a legislative campaign with fart jokes,” stated Tommy Crawford, creative director of Dancing Fox.
“Most videos on this issue tend to be very serious and make whistleblowing seem like this very frightening and rare thing. But in truth, there are many wrong-doings happening every day – in hospitals, in schools, in offices. And people need to feel able to report these. In essence, whistleblowing is about telling the truth, even when it’s a bit uncomfortable, and no-one is better at that than kids.”
The idea for the video came after Crawford walked into his kitchen one day with his hair tied-back and his three-year old niece declared, “Uncle Tommy, you look like a unicorn!”
Europe is on the verge of enacting new legislation that would introduce penalties for people that retaliate against whistleblowers or try to shut them up. The law, the first of its kind, would oblige all EU governments to introduce minimum standards for the protection of truth-tellers, including penalising people that retaliate against whistleblowers or try to shut them up, and shielding truth-tellers from being taken to court for their disclosures.
Legislation like this can overturn the social norm of keeping your head down and your mouth shut. “That’s the kind of social norm you see in a crime network or a police state, not the one we want in Europe,” Crawford explained.
“It’s this social norm that allows unscrupulous people to get away with marketing horse meat as beef, sexually abusing the people they’re supposed to protect, or spying on everyone in the world.”
It is hoped that people throughout the Eu will share the video and tag their government representatives on social media. It had already been viewed thousands of times just hours after being posted on Facebook and Twitter.
