Paw Justice

OK. Thought One when I saw this ad on C4 tonight: Another charity ad, with a bunch of celebrities asking us to do something. Awesome.

I went to the site though (because I do like to give things a chance) and I saw this: and thought, personally, those are incredibly sad stories, but to the sick and twisted who do this sort of thing, I wouldn't be giving them additional ideas.

However, I am behind what they are trying to do, saving animals from harm is a good thing. I love animals and the thought that anyone would dare hurt something as innocent as an animal which cannot defend itself, sickens me. Uncool.

Right, so here I go, I'm going to sign the petition (which on the commercial they tell me I can do) and because I can see this nice little tile on the website:
What I did not notice was the small type:
That's right, it is not an online petition. You can't sign up online, instead it tells you to go an SPCA, Vet or take it upon yourself to start a petition (download the form) and send it in yourself.

Now, I understand why this is. A petition has to be handwritten signatures or some such shit for it to be valid. (I think this came up with the online petition for saving Manners Mall.) What I think is missing here is that they don't say why you can't sign a petition online. They don't explain the bureaucratic crap that for a petition to be acknowledged it has to be handwritten.

Now, to Joe Blow Public, this will look like a FAIL and I don't know that Mr/Mrs Blow will go out of his/her way to make sure they sign up. Yes, NZ 'celebrities' are a strong incentive, but it suddenly got very hard.

If this was my campaign, there are 2 things I would do to try to make this work as hard has possible.
1. EXPLAIN that an online petition cannot go before the bureaucrats and that real signatures are required.
2. Join up with Progressive or Foodstuffs (or both if you could) as well as like a service station/bank and put petitions in all stores around NZ.

I don't think you can expect people to come to you for this, (in vets is fine, but there is a nation of non-pet owners who would happily get behind this and how often do pet owners go to the vet anyway?) you have to make it as easy as possible for people to get in behind it. It is a great thing that they are trying to accomplish, but you have to keep it simple. Put the petition in places that they will trip over it!

Bitchy aside: Did they get a bulk discount on Shortland Street and Outrageous Fortune 'celebs'?