BEING A TEENAGER TODAY IS HARD. AND STRESS-INDUCING. AND HONESTLY, PRETTY DEPRESSING.
You Can, a marijuana prevention campaign, was created to help teens find healthy ways to deal with their emotions and inspire them to follow their dreams. For years, we focused on changing the marijuana conversation in Washington state. Talking with teens—not at them—about the things they could achieve, not the mistakes they may be making. Then, the pandemic happened.
While it’s been hard on all of us—just ask any of the 300 million ads made about it—teens took the life-changing year that was 2020 particularly hard, yet no one seemed to notice. Their lives were supposed to be all about change. Making new friends. Learning new things. Enjoying once-in-a-lifetime experiences. But COVID-19 took all of that away. Everything they knew stopped. And while the rest of the world focused on the adults and workers, they missed out on prom. Friends. Graduation. First kisses. Starting college.
In a sea of COVID ads, we wanted to talk to teens. To tell them that they weren’t overreacting or being dramatic—but that their feelings were valid. This is hard. It took things away from them that they will never get back. But they can get through it. And if they need it, there’s help.
COPY: LACEY GONZALEZ // ART: LARISSA MCCARTNEY // SOCIAL CONTENT & COPY: LACEY GONZALEZ & CHELSEA HAWKINS // SOCIAL ART: STEPHEN HENDERSON // CD: JESSICA SELANDER & PHILLIP ALLEN