People in Need shifts attention from Olympics to world's atrocities

While public attention is focused on Paris 2024, Czech NGO People in Need and VCCP Prague have created a campaign titled 'The Deadly Games' to highlight the atrocities taking place in countries across the world.

By contrasting sporting clashes at the Olympic Games with genuine life and death conflict, the campaign aims to draw attention to human rights and justice and to support fundraising for People in Need projects in the countries it operates in.

‘The Deadly Games’ focuses attention on the fact that while the eyes of the world are on the Olympic Games, much bloodier struggles are taking place in many participating countries.

Running across social, print and online, the campaign features images of human rights issues and conflict in countries where the Czech NGO is currently working.

For an authentic look, VCCP Prague and global content creation studio Girl&Bear Prague worked with photojournalists from around the world including Carlos Herrera from Nicaragua and Edu Ponces from Spain, to select the images.

The images are captioned with the names of Olympic sports and the caption: “Many countries around the world are forcing their people to take part in a much bloodier competition.”

Through the campaign, People In Need aims to draw public attention to the real life atrocities in the countries it operates in which will be overshadowed by coverage of sporting achievement, to remind people that these events deserve the same focus at this time, and to drive fundraising for its projects.

Nadiia Ivanova, director of the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, said: “For more than 25 years, People in Need has been building close partnerships in 20 countries with activists and journalists who are trying to resist regimes that do not hesitate to use brutal force against their own citizens. We wanted to take the opportunity to highlight human rights violations, because dictators and autocrats like to use the big sporting events that were created to promote peace, to legitimise their brutal regimes instead.”

The campaign is based on a provocation: what if the same disciplines we see at the Olympic Games were to appear in the everyday lives of our fellow citizens around the world? The 100m sprint is a race for survival while crossing borders and seeking asylum. Wrestling is a struggle against authority in order to protest peacefully.

'The Deadly Games' was developed on a pro bono basis and will be supported by a reactive content strategy framed around sporting achievement. It will track events in the countries where People in Need operates while these countries are fighting for medals and produce scores and rankings. After the campaign ends, People in Need will work with local artists to design and produce medals for the "winners" of The Deadly Games.

Miguel Molina, senior creative at VCCP Prague, added: "The project was born out of the desire to use our voice and resources to shine a light on issues that are important to us: human rights and equality. We are extremely happy to continue raising important issues with People in Need.”

VCCP Prague previously created the award-winning ‘M1nute of Silence’ campaign for People in Need in 2022, condemning human rights abuse during Qatar's hosting of the football World Cup.