Careful Now: The grandparents’ consent ad got it wrong, but the message still matters |
WHY HAS AN advert depicting excited, loving grandparents attempting to hug their grandchildren provoked such an epic level of online backlash that it has been reported on internationally in the New York Post and has since been removed and reviewed by its creators, The Dublin Rape Crisis Centre?
What in the Father Ted’s is going on here?
The ad, which has been running for a number of days as part of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre (DRCC)’s We-Consent campaign, depicts two children opening their front door to their excited grandparents, who can’t wait to hug their grandchildren.
The younger child leaps into granny and grandad’s arms and warmly embraces them. The older sister stands back from them, with an ‘I’m not sure face’ on her as the grandparents move towards her, puckering up for kisses with the strangest and creepiest use of fisheye camera work I’ve seen outside of a horror flick (if you slapped scary music in the background on this scene, it would freak anyone out). The granddaughter is not feeling the hugs and kisses at all, and the video ends with the tagline -
“Not everyone wants a hug. Even from the people who love them. Awkard? Maybe. Important? Absolutely.”
To say it got people’s backs up is an understatement. Online, critics were quick to label it as ‘woke nonsense.’ What enraged detractors even more was that the We-Consent campaign is funded by the Department of Justice. It is part of an ongoing campaign around consent education, and certain cohorts have interpreted it as the Government telling grandparents not to hug their grandchildren, or as implying they need to second-guess a simple hug now.
Suggestions which Jim O’Callaghan, Minister for Justice, was keen to dispel when he took to X shortly after........