This phobia is really weird but true, and unfortunately I have it.
I am afraid of PSAs (Public Service Announcements).
Why?
When I was young, and still to this day, I see some really scary commercials about certain topics like fire safety, cigarettes and even an unsettlingly silent milk commercial with a pure black background. Okay, okay, the last one is pretty dumb, but the commercials are usually at least close to unsettling!
A certain PSA I remember faintly is about cigarettes, the main target of most modern PSAs, where someone is buying cigarettes and pays the money, but then peels off their skin and puts it on the counter as well. For some reason, the people thought the idea was incredible and make a second one where someone yanks out their teeth. A company that makes most of the really scary PSAs I watch now are The Real Cost, an anti-smoking group funded by the FDC. A common commercial of theirs usually found during adult television blocks or at night that doesn’t bug me that much but grosses out other people called Little Lungs. In this commercial, an anthropomorphic pair of teenage shrunken lungs has a party, but cannot blow out the candles, leading to himself getting caught on fire, then blown out the indie with a hose and getting impaled with a piece of glass. This does a good job grossing people out, especially because Little Lungs is still alive after all this. But hey, I watch Happy Tree Friends, why worry that this dark humor doesn’t freak me out?
Another common one that is dark humor without the humor is one I like to call, “The Teeth Commercial.” In this little horror, a man gets a delivery alone in the middle of nowhere at night that contains the grossest pair of teeth imaginable. He looks away and realizes that his teeth and the gross teeth switch out. It even comes with its own horror music and a black background at the end containing its company name? Because of this and many other Real Cost commercials, even a poster at school by the company with a picture of smoke and a message is able to freak me out!
There’s another nightmare fuel set of commercials with dummies that look like Slappy from Goosebumps talking about people dying from cigarettes. If not that, it’s rat poison in them. I mean, I get they tried to be funny, but I cannot laugh when there are some $5 dummies and an unsettling sound effect before and after each commercial!
I will do as much as squint and stick my fingers all the way up to my eardrums when these commercials come on. It doesn’t help that I have memory of every one, and nor does it help that YouTube has some nightmare fuel that can even scare you with a simple thumbnail!
But despite all these evil, uncanny commercials, there are some good ones out there. Tobacco Free Florida tries to let some people who quit tell their story, and I can tell they are trying to get out of the uncanny valley. And there are some great PSAs, like the Russian “Can’t Buy a Brain” PSAs, that teach kids about stuff that isn’t cool to do while telling a smoothly animated story about a crime boss selling some stuff to a group of wannabe criminals that remind me of Gorillaz (not the animal). Heck, even some famous PSAs like Dumb Ways to Die, which was basically my childhood! So, maybe let’s change these commercials and make them more soothing to watch, like that Micheal Jordan anti-drug PSA, because even though I understand these commercials are trying to scare someone out of something bad, they end up targeting – and scaring – the wrong people. Let’s leave the scares to shows and movies, not commercials!
Enjoy your life,
PineappleSeed
Caryn says
Honestly, why do people make commercials that scare the crap out of little kids? It’s cruel.
Cheyne says
I’m actually glad I found this post. Sometimes, I just get hit with a memory of one that I’m sure has scarred me for life. I even have a memory of running and screaming out of the room. It messed me up badly. The worst part was that at the time I first saw it, it was the last preview on a Madagascar 2 disc. Just a little comforting knowing other people out there have this fear.
Jack says
Omg, I have the same phobia. You should see the Irish road Safety Psas. Good god, there is one where these teens are getting into a car, and the driver asks the back seat guy to put on his seatbelt. Then they end up in a boxing ring, and a dragon tattoo on the back seat guy’s back breathes fire. Then they end up in a sitcom. Then there are two judges that look weird, and one says, “SEATBELT?!” Then, as they are ascending up into an empty amphis, they both maniacally laugh and get crushed by a judge hammer. It cuts to the driver floating in a black background, and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he bounces around then his head hits the camera. Then it cuts back to the teens in the car where the driver says to the teen in the back, “excuse me, do you mind putting on your seatbelt?” The teen in the back reply’s with, “sure, no problem.” Then they drive away, and it ends.
Ash says
Oh my goodness, I’ve finally found people who feel the same way! This has been a big issue since I was really young. Even the ones that weren’t traditionally unsettling really shook me up. I think in my case, it might be the change in tone and seriousness. That’s not even a bad thing, they’re made to be taken seriously, but the fear I felt as a child when I watched a commercial that seemed like all the others only for it to switch to a serious message with a silent background is something I’ll never forget. I can’t seem to get over it even now.
Rhonda says
Finally, some like-minded people who are all afraid of the same things! I can’t sleep well at night if I watch PSAS or the British equivalent of public information films. The creepy songs they sometimes use and the creepy-sounding narrators. I hear it when I close my eyes.
Peyton says
Yes. I do. Any time I hear sirens or commercials I freak out. Also its siren head for me…
kaitlin says
I cant find a name for this phobia anywhere but i also have this. Ever since i was a child i’d run upstairs and rock back and forth and hide, thinking it meant impending doom. I cried whenever i saw the neighborhood watch sign. I’m glad to know i’m not the only one.
similarthings says
Hey! I just wanted to say that I’ve literally never heard of someone else having a phobia of PSAs like I do. Similarly, it originally started out with what I think of as being traumatized by cigarette ads growing up, but it quickly became any type of PSA. I can still watch PSAs, but I become intensely uncomfortable and usually have to turn it off or be scared by them for long periods after. I’ve spent so long trying to figure out why that is. Maybe the breaking of the fourth wall? Something about the way they’re filmed and edited. I have no clue. But thank you for posting about this, I feel less alone.
kaitlin says
For me I think it’s the fear tactics they use, and as a kid I did not grow up in a safe environment so the world was already scary. I had eye cancer when I was three and was rejected and bullied for my prosthetic eye at a very young age. When I had to get checkups for my eye, there was a very rough doctor who would hold me down for anesthesia, and there were also signs of sexual abuse to me during these visits, though my mind erased a lot of these memories to protect its sanity. I think it’s as much about an unstable and scary environment as it is PSA creators being good at their job.