TOW #24: Non-Smoking Ad

Nowadays, most people know that smoking is detrimental to one's life. It's both surprising and disturbing, especially, to witness an adult smoking around children. Not only are the children watching their "role models" smoke a cigarette, but they are also absorbing that nasty second hand smoke. This was an ad that appeared on a billboard that told people to stop smoking near children, if at all. The image uses allusions and an emotional effect in order to display to its viewers that secondhand smoke has a great effect on children, and can cause them to have health problems as well as the person actually smoking.

It's amazing what the effect of a child can do for an image. The picture of the innocent little girl plastered on the billboard automatically drawn the viewers' attention. Without even thinking, the billboard bring in the effect of an appeal to pathos, one that touches the hearts and consciouses of its audience members. As the billboard reads "Children of parents who smoke, get to heaven faster", it's hard to interpret the message wrong. Children are affected by the smoke that their parents bring into the household, and could essentially affect the health and life of the child as well. The Child Health Foundation does a great job of making sure that people get the message by basically telling its audience that children can die because people are being ignorant and smoking around young kids. The little girl portrays every young child in this situation, and the cute look on her face will touch the emotional strings of the audience every time, making the message that much stronger.

Interestingly enough, the ad also alludes to a religion. In the Christian faith, halos are widely used to represent angels. Angels are usually representative of people who have already died. This ad was clever, in that there is a halo above the little girl's head, but the halo is formed by the smoke around her. This is not only a bit horrifying, but it tells the audience that she is going to "heaven" for the wrong reasons. She shouldn't have a halo of smoke around her head, because it isn't she that smokes. It is her parents. It almost brings about a sense of unfairness, as the girl isn't committing the crime, but she is going to have to pay the price. Both the work heaven and the halo contribute to this allusion, which overall may make the ad easier to understand for the audience.

In conclusion, the ad is effective. If anyone saw this on a billboard, they would feel bad for the little girl, and understand that smoking does not just effect the person with the cigarette in their hand. Through the use of religious allusions and an emotional appeal, this ad effectively displays the horrors of smoking and the terrible effects it can have on children with parents who smoke.