Leading an Extraordinary Life: Wise Practices for an HIV ... - 2 Spirits

safer sex campaigns, developed by the dominant Western culture, ethnic minorities, and
indigenous organizations to determine: 1) what elements of some campaigns motivate
Two-Spirit men’s adoption of safer sex behaviours, 2) what elements inadvertently
reinforce or create barriers to Two-Spirit men’s adoption of behaviour change, and 3)
what elements are missing and needed in new campaigns to break down barriers and
motivate behaviour change.
This study recommends wise practices for the implementation of new HIV
prevention initiatives to limit the spread and social impact of HIV in the Two-Spirit
community. Our goal is to make consistent condom use the norm among Two-Spirit
men.
1.2 Social Marketing
A primary tool in the prevention of HIV infection is social marketing. It is
important here to outline the principles of social marketing. First, it is useful to think
about commercial marketing or what is more simply called “advertising”. Advertisers
have refined their ability to make us want to buy something into a science. Whether it is a
pair of jeans, SUV, or plasma TV, advertisers use sophisticated research methods to
figure out whom (“target consumers”) they want to buy this object and how to sell it to
them. One of their primary methods is to assemble “focus groups” of targeted consumers
(i.e., teens, yuppies, African-Canadians) and try out a variety of prepared messages and
approaches to receive feedback and refine their ad until the message achieves its
maximum power. Their goal is to figure out how to motivate consumers to make this
product an essential part of their lifestyles. The aim of all advertising agencies is to turn
a consumer item into a fetish item, or in the very least, something fashionable, trendy, or
desirable. Of course, their other goal is to sell products in order to make a profit.
Advertisers work hard to avoid a worse case scenario in which their message offends
segments of the population and leads to avoidance or even a boycott of their message.
A wide variety of not-for-profit organizations have adopted and reformulated the
methods of advertisers to sell particular “social behaviours” to the public. 4 Health
4 A.R. Andreasen, Marketing Social Change: Changing behavior to promote health, social development,
and the environment (San Francisco: Jossey Bass: 1995).
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