The Journal de Montréal today had an outraged (outraged!) piece on how the local cops are cracking down on speeders as of late. It was prototypical Journal, complete with screaming headline and the suggestion, unwritten as it was, that the whole thing is yet another grab at the little guy’s wallet. (For the record, I love Le Journal; it is the only newspaper in the country to have both the news sense and the resources to do tabloid properly.)
For a bracing counterpoint to this, I dare you to watch these videos (here, here and especially here.) When it comes to awareness campaigns, there is a tradition of bloody carnality here in Quebec. Everyone knows that drinking, speeding and distraction behind the wheel are bad; only in Quebec are you reminded of as much with graphic violence and bloody cadavers. (Quebec needs to be reminded. It has one of the highest road-accident death rates in the country.)
Which brings us to carnality. In this ad, which always seem to play near the end of hockey games for some reason, a boy and a girl hook up at a bar, go home and get nearly naked. This being Quebec, I figured the next shot would be of the couple impaled on the roof of a car, and that it was an ad about the dangers of sex in first-floor apartments. But no; it’s for STDs, and the boy in question is lying on a gurney in agony over whatever disease(s) he picked up. It doesn’t make you want to wear condoms so much as wrap yourself in Saran Wrap.