Looking At This Girl Vomit Will Make Young Aussies Stop Binge Drinking, Hopefully

I think most of us can agree that binge drinking, especially in many pockets of Australian culture, continues to be a dangerous concern. But this new campaign aimed at battling it via augmented reality images of people chundering, is at best weird as hell and at worst a huge waste of time.

DrinkWise, which admittedly so far has a fairly solid run in progressive campaigns against the dangers of drinking to excess, has announced their latest project to inform and educate set to launch in Melbourne this Christmas period. Called ‘The Internet Remembers’ the centrepiece of it is the installation of numerous “statues” featuring images of people who’ve had about ten or so too many frothy ones and are feeling it hard.

The kicker though is that they’re not literal IRL statues or busts, but merely blank platforms which require the use of an augmented reality app to come alive. Yep, augmented reality. That ~super cool~ technological phenomenon everyone thought was the future for a while but so far has only turned out to be a fairly minor fad no one really uses.

Cute pic of me and my boo.

Again, our nation’s drinking habits definitely need to be combated with DrinkWise’s latest statistics once again proving many young Aussies are going too hard, too often. The latest data shows that one in four young men and one in five young women over the age of 18 drink to excess on a night out.

Also, the idea that young adults will respond to the notion that their shameful post-bev voms and messy drunken behaviour can live forever on the internet, isn’t a bad one. It’s just a little dumb to think that anyone is engaging with AR apps from a social change organisation whilst out on the piss. Speaking of…

“Am I peeing right now? I’m peeing right now aren’t I?”

DrinkWise CEO, Simon Strahan said in a press release “The fact that young adults see vomiting and making a fool of themselves as a greater risk from excessive drinking than their long-term health means we need to take an innovative approach to our moderation message.”

Agreed, but is this it? Honestly, I hope I’m wrong on this one and wish this binge drinking campaign all the best. The first few “statues” will go up in 125 pubs across the country, starting with Melbourne this month.

You can find out more about it all via the video below and on the DrinkWise website here.