Brief Explanation

With racism on the rise, we needed New Zealanders to see that racism starts small, and that even giving only a little to racism was helping it grow. When it comes to appeals, everyone understands that every little bit adds up and makes a difference. So our appeal did the same. The New Zealander of the Year, Taika Waititi, got New Zealanders to consider that every little bit of casual racism they were giving was contributing to the bigger cause. The reverse appeal left Kiwis feeling less comfortable feeding it, tolerating it, and allowing it to grow, and they committed instead to giving racism no laughs, no smiles, no positive reactions, no support.

The Campaign

When it comes to appeals, everyone understands that every little bit adds up and makes a difference. So our appeal did the same, showing Kiwis that every little tiny bit of casual racism they were giving was adding up and contributing to the bigger cause. With the reverse appeal, we challenged people to question how much they wanted to give to racism. This made even the smallest bit count, so they felt less comfortable feeding it, tolerating it, and allowing it to grow, and instead committed to giving racism no laughs, no smiles, no positive reactions, no support. ‘Give Nothing to Racism’ gave people a standard to live up to, and a way to respond to even the smallest examples of racism, in the real world and online.

Creative Execution

Taika Waititi’s profile, attitude and cheekiness made him the perfect voice to deliver our confronting message in a way that people wanted to own. He shared the video to his followers online on June 5th 2017. By launching in social we could address Kiwis directly, challenging them to rethink their views on casual racism in a public forum to spark conversations around a previously brushed-off topic. ‘Give Nothing to Racism’ and the video served as answers in those debates, used continually as tools to reframe online conversations and examples of casual racism. We identified active social commentators, businesses across all sectors, educational institutions, city councils, mainstream and minority media outlets, and over fifty influential Kiwi celebrities across industries and ethnicities. We developed personalised approaches to each, seeding out the video alongside supporting context documents, calling on them to popularise the idea from launch and build relationships to ensure their ongoing support.

Viewed more times than our entire population, the campaign reached 187 countries, has been covered by all major national news outlets, and internationally by The Guardian, The Independent, The Telegraph, and other respected commentators. Give Nothing has become a standard adopted by ordinary Kiwis, businesses and schools, many now working on internal policies to minimise racism. Three major cities have adopted it, and it was presented to UN Committee on Racial Injustice as a significant action taken against racism. Six months after the last paid activity we continue to see Give Nothing show up on social as a response to casual racism – not from us, but from Kiwis who have taken on the cause and answered Taika’s challenge. • 79% recognized even small acts of racism can be harmful • 40% thought about their own views and behaviours • 26% talked with others • 14% changed their behaviour towards people of different racial backgrounds

Targeting educated, urban New Zealanders aged 20-50 who consider themselves respectful of other races, we interviewed Kiwis across the country and discovered a core value of our broad audience: they’re good people who didn’t believe in racism’s right to exist in any way. But, they also told us, they sometimes let casually racist comments and actions slide – either their own, or someone else’s – both online and offline because it seemed harmless. And yet, it wasn’t harmless to those that have experienced casual racism their entire life. We needed to show Kiwis that racism lives on when we excuse it, give it room to breathe, and passively endorse it. In challenging them with this we needed to popularise the viewpoint so they could own it, and create tools for organisations, media, councils, and everyday Kiwis to express this support in real world social situations, in news coverage, and in social media.