“Thinking about eating before drinking alcohol is the basis”: Why the new campaign against alcohol abuse among young people arouses mockery and criticism: Femme Actuelle Le MAG

This Monday, September 25, 2023, the Ministry of Health and Public Health France launched a new prevention campaign aimed at young people to raise awareness of the risks of alcohol consumption. It includes four posters, as well as videos broadcast on social networks. The prevention campaign “This is the basis” features several slogans such as “Drink water, if you consume alcohol”, “Keep an eye on your friends in the evening”or “Take your friends home if they’ve had too much to drink”each sentence being accompanied by the slogan “This is the basis”.

The new campaign to prevent alcohol consumption among young people accused of trivializing its consumption

A campaign which is therefore directly targeted at young people, and which receives a very poor reception. Indeed, the ambiguity of the message transmitted raises questions: the approach would consist of saying that young people would consume alcohol whatever happens, so we might as well support them. This message is not concrete enough, according to Bernard Basset, doctor and president of the Addictions France association, interviewed on France Inter : “There are messages that can be misinterpreted because they are ambiguous. From the moment you drink water, is it not very serious to drink alcohol? It’s ambiguity of the message that questions.” The message transmitted therefore seems to become counterproductive, going so far as to normalize alcohol consumption, while 85.7% of young people aged 16-17 have already experimented with alcohol according to ameli.fr.

This campaign is also accused of not mentioning the health risks due to alcohol consumption. In fact, the different sentences only contain messages to support consumption, in a risk reduction strategy. Bernard Basset finds that it would have been more constructive to emphasize the risks linked to alcohol consumption, in particular the fact that “drinking alcohol increases the risk of heart rhythm disorders and the risk ofHemorrhagic strokes.”

New alcohol awareness campaign mocked for “young talk”

On X, Internet users also made fun of the chosen expressions, accusing the campaign of wanting to imitate “young talk”, only to ultimately fall flat. The target audience thus has the feeling that older people wanted to imitate their popular expressions, without understanding them, or using them properly. These criticisms are therefore accompanied by diversions from the campaign, with the aim of making fun of it.

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