A Public Service Announcement

The best public service announcement we ever received was this one here (MP3 download), which was mailed to every radio station in the country by Donald Wildmon's American Family Association, which apparently still harbors fantasies of liberal gestapo squads shoveling heaps o' Bibles into the secular humanist bonfire. No word on whether this magical piece of radio theater generated the million signatures they were aiming for.

After that, the silver medal for funniest PSA has to go to Father Harry, God Squad.   I dont have the record handy, but the streaming realaudio is here. It's a touching tale of a young boy who loved his mother so much that he was forced to cut off his hands. Or should I say hand. Since he already lost the first one in an unfortunate fishing accident.

The Mexican government has a tradition of printing up public service posters with wonderful artwork portraying the hazards of Alcoholismo, La Prostitucion, the scourge of Drogadiccion and Los Problemas Sociales in general.

While no satire can top Donald Wildmon or Father Harry, that doesn't stop people from trying. Eric Fensler remixed a batch of GI Joe video PSAs, which earned them a Cease and Desist letter from GI Joe's parents. And then there was Evolution Contol Committee's We Will Rock You PSA (Streaming Realaudio).

But the ultimate Public Service Announcement - the Holy Grail for PSA hunters - is an Arthur Godfrey clip which was recorded at the behest of President Dwight Eisenhower during the height of the cold war in the mid-Fifties. Godfrey recorded an announcement which was to be aired only in the event that the US was attacked with Russian nuclear weapons. After all, who better to calm raw, irradiated nerves than the man who sang that great paean to abused women, Slap Her Down Again, Paw!

Comments

[Jacob Haller]

What exactly is Norman shouting? "Ironing globe, paper"?

[jima]

Obviously losing a hand affected the speech centers in Norman's brain. After he lost his other hand, he started shouting "Car leg, broomstick!"

But you don't hear Father Harry talking about THAT, now do ya?

[Joey Headset]

Hey, Father Harry is still going strong... puts out 4 Discs of PSAs every year. If WFMU doesn't still receive Father Harry, I can drop them an email and make sure you get your quarterly fix of Harry!

[Station Manager Ken]

Hey Joey - Yes, please send us all the Father Harry you can! Thanks.

-ken

[David Kaye]

The "God Squad" vignettes were produced by the Archdiocesan Media Center in San Francisco for distribution to commercial rock stations. Locally they aired on KFRC, one of the RKO Drake format stations, the #1 music station here for many years.

I was drawn to this website because I happened to see an interview with Fr. Harry on local TV this morning. He's still around, but has been kicked upstairs, managing the archbishop's media affairs now.

[brian]

it sucks that you attributed the GI Joe PSA remixes to ebaumsworld. that site has never done anything* original, they just take other people's work, watermark it with their url and post it. the GI Joe PSAs were done by Eric Fensler of Fenslerfilm.

http://www.fenslerfilm.com/

for more on the internet hatred of ebaumsworld, see their wikipedia entry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebaum

* - i'm sure they've done something original, but i don't know what.

[John Seeler]

I used to play this Father Harry God Squad PSA at KMSU-AM at Mankato State Unniversity in 1975/76. It was the collective favourite of most of the DJ's working at KMSU. Considering the competition - Star Trek Hard Drug Abuse PSA - this is notable appreciation. Thanks WFMU for allowing me to share Father Harry's genius with my London Family.

[Kang Yang Sam]

I came accross this blog today and noticed that the song, "Slap Her Down Again, Paw!" was refered to as a "great peaen to abuse women". The person that wrote that evidently never read the lyrics to the song: "slap her down again, paw, slap her down again. Make her tell us more paw, tell us where she's been. We don't need our neighbors talkin' about our kin. Slap her down again, paw, slap her down again." For those who don't know, that song was about infidelity in a time when fidelity was prised, not like today when people have sex to see if the person is suitable to date, instead of dating someone to see if they are suitable to have sex with. It would also be interesting to find out that person's veiw of the "Sarlet Letter" or the song "We Don't Have to Take Our Clothes Off". I wish it were still "when the air was clean and sex was dirty." People wonder why AIDS, HIV, and other forms of STDs are so rampid in todays society. Look at what is out there today. Songs like "Permiscuous", "Don't you wish your girlfriend was a lot like me?" and "It's getting hot in here, why don't you take your clothes off". It is also harder today to get a divorce just because a spouse is unfaithful, because it is so common. The U.S. wants to restric "marriage" to a man and a woman unions, but those unions don't mean the same as they did when Arthur Godfry sang that song, so what is the point to any marriage being legal?