History Main / PublicServiceAnnouncement

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tteHhYh9rU An anti-speeding campaign]] by Think! shows a man who keeps seeing a dead child everywhere goes. It was a kid he knocked down. Made all the more chilling by that you ''know'' it's a dummy, and you're still freaked out.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDXSMCDa4WQ This anti-child prostitution PSA from 1999]] shows the typical prices of meat at that time, before cutting to the price of a child prostitute, the ''cheapest'' of them all.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vupjeHf3N6w This animal welfare PSA, also from 1999]], shows a man who's imprisoned for eating dog meat, which is punishable by law. "When you eat a dog, you end up in a cage."

*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtREJQgws7w A man gets drunk at a family barbecue]] and picks up his nephew and spins him around, but crashes into a wall and seriously injures the child. The man is chased out of the house and collapses in an alleyway sobbing.
*** People getting drunk and suffering the consequences (injuries, emotional fits, inability to remember the night before) while the sober version of themself watches and cringes in horror.
*** An office worker goes out to the pub after work and starts drinking to soothe her nerves, getting steadily drunker. She is eventually abducted/presumably raped by a man who follows her. This ad led to complaints of [[UnfortunateImplications victim-blaming]] in the premise.
*** A drunk dad at a wedding tries to break-dance, injures his back and is publicly berated by his humiliated kids.
* There was this ad about the dangers of speeding, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2MGCV-92e4 Here]], where time pauses and the two drivers get out of their vehicles to talk. It doesn't stop time from resuming and the crash happening. Other people make mistakes, drive carefully so you can react to them is the message.

* Child abuse hotline Bantay Bata 163's [=PSAs=] are also this, in regards to stopping child abuse, child trafficking, and the like. Also scares the living dickens of everyone who watched them as kids. One of them, even though only portrayed in chalk drawings regarding child trafficking, is already scary enough on its own, no thanks to the child's voice. One watch of that PSA and you'll never see the name [[Franchise/{{Frozen}} Elsa]] the same way again. Have fun getting that nightmare off your head.

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSKYO5OGEFQ Two human candles]] [[ImMelting melt]] while a narrator warns about the consequence of drugs.

** The Singapore Anti-Narcotics Association is an obscure successor to the [=PDFS=]. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKM-NVKEHDg This]] is their only offering: an artistic writing performance with the words matching the narrative. Language warning.

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpFT9olAHMs A bunch of drinkers are cleaning their breath to avoid the breathalyser test:]] drinking water, coffee and tea; brushing their teeth; and even doing exercise at the carpark.

* South Africa's Parents For Responsible Viewing released the Biggie Bear ads in 2004 to remind parents to control what their kids watch. Yes, ''[[Advertising/BiggieBear there is an article for them.]]'' They feature the titular "Biggie Bear" doing seemingly child-friendly things as the PSA begins, only for [[SubvertedKidsShow each ad to take a dark and disturbing turn by the end]], where Biggie proceeds to show his true colors and torture (and, in the first one, kill) the poor schmuck who runs into him. The third one is arguably the worst, as it shows him downright raping Miss Pussycat, the "friend" in question.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZ0QgVi_LE&ab_channel=rocketraccoon19 This PSA]] has a man, implied to be HIV-positive, raping his daughter off-screen while a woman listens via a baby monitor. The fact that she can only sit there and listen in horror make the whole thing ten times worse. The PSA becomes much worse when the ad ends with the tagline "If you won't stop him from raping her, who will?" when the whole point of the PSA shows a woman helpless to stop a girl from being raped.

** The THT has also made some posters regarding STI testing; one features two fingers, with one telling the other how the new HIV rapid test will give them results in 20 minutes. Another features three phallic-looking cacti, representing the three pricks (as in vaccinations) one needs to protect themselves from Hepatitis B.

* A World War II PSA called on Americans to carpool in order to conserve fuel for the war effort -- "When you ride ALONE, you ride with Hitler!" (But if you're riding with Hitler, you ''are'' carpooling). Creator/BillMaher updated and parodied this PSA in his book, "When You Ride ALONE You Ride with bin Laden: What the Government SHOULD Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism".

* How about the drunk driving PSA from the 1980s, with the two beer mugs toasting in slow motion, and exploding on contact, with the sound of a car crash underneath? [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jFAvIuAev0 See it here.]]

** There was also [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZSvNP2Sd90 the ad]] which showed someone clearly drunk getting into a car with some friends. When the person starts the car, the next scene shows the car on fire and the people turned into [[StrippedToTheBone burning skeletons.]]

* Since the late 1980s, the Partnership for a Drug Free America (now called Advertising/PartnershipToEndAddiction) has created memorable [=PSAs=] warning parents and children of the dangers of illegal drug use (though in later years they created ads about prescription drug abuse as well). Many of these ads could be deeply disturbing, which didn't stop them from being aired during Saturday morning cartoons in the late 80s and early 90s.

** A bizarre 1995 TV spot from them (NSFW) titled "Knobs in Space", supposedly animated by Creator/AardmanAnimations, features a rocket ship shaped like... [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin well, a knob]] (British slang for a penis) discovering a black hole, and trying to enter it. However, the black hole teleports away every time the rocket tries to go inside. The constellation Sagittarius directs the dejected rocket towards what initially looks like the Sun, until the next scene shows that it was actually a yellow condom, which the knob rocket puts on before successfully entering the black hole, causing a massive explosion with the words "The Big Bang Theory" popping out[[note]]this ad actually predates [[Series/TheBigBangTheory the series]] by over a decade[[/note]], before the words "Wear a condom" and the trust's logo appear.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAsX3iHm93M One railway safety ad]] for national railway company [=KTM=], made in the 1990s. A schoolgirl and her grandfather get hit by a train while crossing the railway. The aftermath shows the girl's shoe and gramps's bicycle wheel, both stained with blood. The crash was filmed using mannequins but was realistic enough to scare people up.

* Disrespect Nobody is a new campaign to combat domestic and sexual abuse, featuring various talking human body parts who talk about how forcing your partner into having sex or becoming violent when your partner disagrees with you on something is not cool.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6njNnkUBj4 A public service announcement from]] [[Main/TurnOfTheMillennium early 00s]] sharing ways to reduce mental stress, ranging from setting a more realistic outcome to sharing problems to even building a happy home.[[/folder]]

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6njNnkUBj4A public service announcement from]] [[Main/TurnOfTheMillennium early 00s]] sharing ways to reduce mental stress, all the while accompanied by the sound of a flute being played in the duration of the ad.[[/folder]]

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6njNnkUBj4A public service announcement from]] the [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TurnOfTheMillennium early 00s]] sharing ways to reduce mental stress, all the while accompanied by the sound of a flute being played in the duration of the ad.[[/folder]]

[[/folder]]

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqTzrz_Tto8 Another one]] is set inside a pinball machine based on the ''Pinball/LastActionHero'' board, where the player earns a lot of score bonuses. However, the video fast-forwards to where the game tilts. The player shoots another ball, but this time it wanders aimlessly as the music distorts and the machine's artwork changes into eerie drawings of drug-addicted women, accompanied by [[HellIsThatNoise echoing distorted screams]] while the ball ''shorts out the machine'' with every hit before cutting to the machine, whose sparking and twitching becomes reminiscent of a person suffering a drug overdose. Finally, the ad flash-cuts with ''breaking glass sounds'' to the now-wrecked machine in the middle of a landfill.

* Korea's Ministry of Health released [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H98WwKjwkz0 this creepy series of ads]] in 2005. You might want to stay away from cigarettes after the sight of three individuals clearly suffering from smoke withdrawal, all set to eerie music. That [[HellIsThatNoise harrowing scream]] at each ad's tagline doesn't help.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mh65x5pK2uk Here's]] a vintage one about the dangers of... putting bags on a pram or pushchair. As silly as it may seem, the ad made it work by showing a baby fall several feet head-first on glass shattering on the pavement, and its mother letting out an [[HellIsThatNoise electronically distorted, loud and echoing scream]] in both the beginning ''and'' end.

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1eUV_7K-8U One gun safety PSA]] in the form of an 8 year old's unboxing video. The kid "unboxes" a gun and some bullets that he finds in his parents' bedroom, loads the gun on camera, and is implied to have accidentally shot himself at the end. The PSA emphasizes the need to lock guns by mentioning that 8 kids are shot by unlocked or misused guns every day.

* In the early 2000s, [=PSAs=] with animated characters from Creator/{{Disney}} were popular, such as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuc3fSYt7Wc one]] with characters from ''Franchise/TheLittleMermaid'' about ocean pollution, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoADMvEFReg one]] with ''WesternAnimation/{{Cinderella}}'' about booster seat safety (which makes no sense, because Cinderella was too old to use booster seats in her carriage), [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qevHueqVz_E two]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un-t1rHR0u4 ads]] with ''WesternAnimation/{{Bambi}}'' and ''WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty'' about wildfires (the ''Sleeping Beauty'' one featured the scene where Maleficent turns into a dragon). An [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4-pVfbFUPg anti-smoking ad]] from the same campaign featured footage from ''WesternAnimation/{{Pinocchio}}.''

* Then there were several ads against crack, rock cocaine. One featured Creator/PaulReubens ''in character as Pee Wee Herman'', another had [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cic9djMyVl4 Clint Eastwood.]] The Pee Wee one is often noted for its Narm. Other ads in the same campaign featured [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXvvAAulbp0 Bette Midler,]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tohCKeXBndE Rae Dawn Chong,]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hfIEq3EYLM Ally Sheedy,]] and the late [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gC_mBBPejU Olivia Newton-John.]]

* In the early 2000s, [=PSAs=] with animated characters from Creator/{{Disney}} were popular, such as one with characters from ''Franchise/TheLittleMermaid'' about ocean pollution, one with ''WesternAnimation/{{Cinderella}}'' about booster seat safety (which makes no sense, because Cinderella was too old to use booster seats in her carriage), ones with ''WesternAnimation/{{Bambi}}'' and ''WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty'' about wildfires (the ''Sleeping Beauty'' one featured the scene where Maleficent turns into a dragon). An [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4-pVfbFUPg anti-smoking ad]] in the same campaign featured footage from ''WesternAnimation/{{Pinocchio}}.''