NSPCC adverts

[sansouci]

does anyone else cry over these? I can hardly bear to watch them.

Yep and I find it very sad that ads like that are necessary

When my children were babies, I cried over one advert, and sent the £25 they asked for to save a child's sight.

Since then, I have been sent videos, pens and even money, asking for further donations.

yes, that's a problem. I'd be glad to "give £2 a month" or even more but I don't wish to be hounded or trapped into something dodgy, IYSWIM

I absolutely hate these adverts, not just because they upset me (though they do) but because I hate the way their basic argument is 'if you don't like child cruelty, give us some money' without actually taking the trouble to explain how the money is going to help. It just leaves me suspicious that the money is going to go towards more adverts making sure everyone knows that being nasty to children is a Bad Thing.

fairyjay why did they send you money?

I sent an email to the NSPCC recently about the horrible book being sold by Amazon. They replied straight away and said that they would investigate the authors and the website and a representative would be talking to Amazon to try and get the books withdrawn from sale. So I think they do actually work for their money.

I hate those kind of ads though and I don't always agree with their policies.

I can't remember the detail of the promotion - it was several years ago, but it was along the lines of here's 10p - how much more can you raise.

i hate the way that they always show a baby when they ask for money and the children are always crying which makes me wonder how they get them to do that so young too. surely they can't act that well at that age

I think charity fundraising says as much about the public as it does the organisation. Charities need to raise funds to do their work and will run the campaigns that raise the most cash i.e. what the public are likely to respond to. If people just gave their money to them in the first place, they wouldn't need to raise funds!

I hate those adverts as well, the bit where they say "open your eyes, and your hearts" should actually say "open your eyes, and your wallet".

And if you gave them £2 a month you would never get rid of them. I attended a toddler group which is run by the nspcc once, had a phone call some time later from one of their representatives saying that they needed money to pay for online counsellors, and would I give £15 a month to pay for that. I said no and he said "oh ok, how much shall I put you down for then?" very pushy and offputting imo.

agreed beansprout, and charities like the nspcc, rspca etc often have the aaaaw factor.

I did some collecting for the RSPCA once. I took my guide dog with me (without harness) but people were very quick to notice the dog and I collected nearly three times more than the others who were collecting in the same place.

Imo the government should get their act together and do something about cruelty to children, charities like the NSPCC shouldn't exist - ss should have the funding/resources to prevent these instances of cruelty

i've got to say the nspcc is one of the charities i don't mind giving money to.i think it's very telling about this country that we have a ROYAL society for the protection of animals but only a NATIONAL one for children.
the adverts are terribly sad but if they work, then good for them.

I find them very distressing, unpleasant and manipulative. Its sad that they need to resort to it really. The one that really irritated was a billboard ad, which had a happy cartoon mum cooing at the baby with a headlline along the lines "In a few hours she will be shaking him like a rag doll" and info to donate. IMO it would be more far more useful to have an ad saying if you think you could hurt your baby you should...plus the usual advice.

I received a mailing from the NSPCC which sickened me - it was a baby name book, you know the sort, A-Z with "definitions" of the names?

Instead of definitions it had "Albert - beaten by his mother at the age of two..." type descriptions - pretty detailed stuff.

Incredibly shocking thing to receive in the post - and had the exact opposite effect on me - I didn't want to give money to a charity who sent stuff like that to people, cold.

I had that one too, hunker, wasn't it sickening? And I already have a monthly standing order with the NSPCC - which really annoys me: what a waste of money to send mailshots to someone who already gives regularly. It says in the small print something along the lines of "we cannot check our database to see who already donates so if you do we're sorry to bother you please pass this on.." Can't imagine anyone I could have passed that particular item on to.

I guess they have research to show that those shock type ads work - but they are horribly disturbing.