Éduc’alcool’s new ad campaign: 'What exactly are we laughing at?'

“I think it’s clear that what we’re supposed to understand from this image is the traumatic consequence of drinking too much — which is, you might hook up with someone who isn’t young, or who doesn’t meet the conventional norms of beauty,” says Peter C. van Wyck, a professor in Concordia’s Department of Communications.

“The implication that a middle-aged woman could ‘happen to you’ as the result of an incapacity is socially and politically unacceptable. It suggests older women aren’t legitimate objects of desire.”

An independent, not-for-profit organization, Éduc’alcool runs programs designed to encourage Quebecers to make “enlightened, responsible decisions” about drinking. 

According to Hubert Sacy, director general of Éduc'alcool, this ad was tested on four focus groups of two men and two women. In an email reply to van Wyck’s complaint, Sacy reported that the focus groups gave the advertisement a grade of 9/10 and he claims nobody detected any ageism or sexism in the campaign.

‘Is this something we want to accept?’

“That they tested this with young people and nobody found a problem is in itself problematic,” says van Wyck, who plans to use the Éduc’alcool poster as a launch pad for in-class discussions on ethics and imagery in his introductory Communication Theory course this term (COMS 240). “It highlights the real importance of what we teach in communication and media studies.” 

Van Wyck believes that in order to think critically about visual consumption, students need to ask themselves what they’re accepting when they look at an image without questioning it.

A public service campaign should aim higher, he points out, than a commercial campaign from the private sector. Witness Axe’s male grooming advertisements, which are part of a targeted, product-driven campaign for a private company.

“Yet in Éduc'alcool’s case, it is difficult to tell exactly what the status of this organization really is. It is a charity organization, with an operating budget of over $3 million annually. Yet its eight-person Board of Directors includes representation by the (SAQ) Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ), leaving one to wonder if keeping things ‘humorous’ simply serves the interests of an alcohol industry wishing to appear socially responsible.” 

“Can we really believe that the SAQ — a provincial crown corporation — has an interest in people drinking less?”

According to van Wyck, the Éduc’alcool poster aims “appallingly low” for a public service campaign, supporting the notion that women have expiry dates. Once expired, the notion goes, these women don makeup and prey upon our inebriated youth.

“This raises serious questions about advertisements, the relationship between captions and images, the power relations concealed within them and the handling of difficult topics like drinking and sexual relationships,” says van Wyck.

“Part of the problem is there’s no such thing as just an image, and the extent to which people believe there is makes them easy pray for ads and other forms of social communication that ask us to accept politically reprehensible representations. ”

Hear more of Peter C. van Wyck’s opinions in his introductory Communication Theory course (COMS 240) this term.