@cb5
A big part of what the common idea of rape culture is is that we shame the victims of rape and focus our efforts on telling them not to get raped in various ways rather than targeting the people committing the crimes in the first place. Explicitly telling people not to rape rather than focusing all your efforts on telling people not to be raped is the sort of change that most activists opposing the rape culture want to see, and generally they’re trying to make changes that stop society shaming the victims and make society more overtly against people committing rape. Sometimes their efforts are misguided and they rail against the wrong targets but in general that’s what they’re trying to do.
You know what’s the irony of this? The easiest way to accomplish this goal would to be get in contact with victim shelters/nonprofit organizations/any company really that has some sort of advertising campaign against rape and call up their ceo’s or head people and ask them to change their advertising strategy.
I recently graduated with a advertising degree and let me just say it’s not that hard to do. The people low on the ladder when it comes to a business tend to not listen cause they tend to just be some person doing their job, but if you get a hold of the higher ups and go “Hello I am <insert name here> I would like to talk to you about <insert ad campaign here>” sure getting a hold of them is hard cause the people lower on the chain of command don’t want to get in trouble, but the higher up you go the more likely they are to listen.
Also when it comes to advertising it’s not that hard to change the body copy of a ad. It takes about a hour to make sure everything is good and dandy in the new ad, the only real problem is the costs for printing the new ad. If the people have already printed it and such the best strategy is to get a hold of the higher ups and phrase it to where future ad campaigns will feature the change.
The reason why so many people fail at accomplishing this is that in order to get a hold of the higher ups and to talk to them about changes to their future ad campaigns against rape to change it from “don’t get raped” to “don’t rape” is that you NEED to be courteous and as well as know how to talk to them and get them to reconsider.
For example if I was talking to a ceo of a company and I was doing their advertisement I would go, “Greetings am I speaking with <insert name here>? Oh I am. Hi my name is <my real name here>. I am from <insert company here> and your company recently commissioned us to do a advertisement for you. Right, yeah that’s us. I was calling about a couple of ideas I had for the advertisement that would make it easier to read and such. Oh no nothing is really wrong with it. I was just thinking about that it would be kind of hard for drivers to read all that going 70mph. Oh no I don’t mean it like that, in fact I think the design is simply marvelous, rather I don’t want to drivers to get in a wreck reading it. Well shortening the message would certainly help, but I was thinking about giving it a extra kick to the message so people remember it. Well that would certainly work, how about creating a catchy headline that the reader would remember even if they don’t read the rest? Eh, I’m not too sure about that one. It’s too long. I was thinking like two words at most. I know your idea is too long. What idea do I have? I brainstormed a bit earlier and came up with, “Don’t rape” now I know it’s not the slogan you wanted, but I think it puts forth the same idea you wanted in only two words. Yeah I know it’s only two words, but even if someone glances over it for half a second they’ll remember the billboard and see your logo and thus remember it. Okay I’ll do that right away. Thank you for your time sir/madame, and hope to do further business with you”
The reason why it’s so hard for other people to get stuff done and change ad campaigns and such is simply put people like pinkponie when they call up a company to change a anti-rape psa their complaint gets put in the shredder.
Rule of thumb when trying to get a higher up to listen to you, the nicer you are and the more you suggest that your idea is their idea just “spruced up” and more memorable the more likely they are to listen.
Unfortunately far too many people call in and go, “Fuck you man I want to file a complaint about your stupid ass fucker company. Get your ceo before I call my lawyer” and well that complaint goes right into the shredder as soon as the call is done.
TL:DR; One of the biggest problems is that so many people that do try to change mass media messages deserve a gold medal in stupidity cause most of the calls are by people thinking swearing and threatening a lawsuit actually gets people to listen.