Dumb Ways to Die: The clever campaign aimed at train safety

Some of you who takes the train may have stumbled on this campaign (I mean, come on, how can you NOT, when the posters are basically plastered all over the Metro?). A quick Google search revealed that this is one campaign created by advertising power house, McCann, that is targeted to address train track suicide rates in Victoria. Statistics revealed that Victoria has the highest rail suicide in whole of Australia, averaging one death on Victoria's tracks every week.

The video features an upbeat catchy tune that addresses Melbourne Metro Train Transport safety.

While suicides are a prevalent and worrying issue, this is not widely spoken and the effects are not only for the victims, but extends to families or witnesses of this tragic event. Whether their deaths are intentional or not, I must admit that the trauma it has on witnesses (and drivers) has life-time traumatic effects.

This prompted international marketing powerhouse, McCann, who came up with the ingenious, and hilarious campaigns that gets an otherwise taboo message across to youths and the public. Named as "Dumb Ways to Die", the campaign lists all kinds of death-inviting behaviour by setting hair on fire, having "private parts" eaten by piranhas and inviting a psychotic killer into the house.

Since its release in November 2012 the video has gathered over 62 million views (as of this time) and parodies popping all over the Internet. The campaign also attracted worldwide's attention, winning 7 awards-all gold with 2 Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions International festival of Creativity, 14 nominations at London's D&AD awards, and is the first campaign that received it's own Wikipedia page.

Controversially, the campaign also received some critics, reasoning that it suggested and glamorises creative ways to die. In fact, the campaign was banned in a few countries, including the Russian government who stated that :

“The song’s lyrics contains a description of different ways of committing suicide, such as: using drugs beyond their expiration date, standing on an edge of a platform, running across the rails, eating superglue and other. The animated personages demonstrate dangerous ways of suicide in attractive for children and teenagers comic format. The lines such as “hide in a dryer” and “what’s this red button do?” contain an incitement to commit those acts. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumb_Ways_to_Die).”

My two cents on the phenomenal success of this campaign is that it tactfully delivers an otherwise taboo message across in a hilarious manner. Whether the campaign has received success cannot merely be measured with "views" on the Youtube (or basically any superficial statistics), but the REAL impact it may potentially have in saving any lives or in preventing anyone from committing suicide.