Aardman Animations the company behind Wallace and Gromit have been charged with changing attitudes towards disability through a new advertising campaign.

The brainchild of Leonard Cheshire Disability, the initiative's remit is to increase awareness and challenge perceptions of disabled people. Owing much to the beloved Creature Comforts ads, the campaign employs animated plasticine characters allied with the voices of disabled people that relate their ostracization from society through poor attitudes.

The tag-line and general message of the advertisements will be "change the way you see disability". The campaign can be viewed online now and begins with wheelchair bound Spud the Slug, saying, "…that many people say – oh you're in a wheelchair – you're rubbish. You can't do anything. A lot of it, it is ignorance."

Peg the Hedgehog follows Spud enjoying a cup of tea. She says, "People have assumed that wheels mean… nothing up here in the brain, you know."

Flash the Sausage Dog closed the campaign saying, "Because we're in a wheelchair doesn't mean to say we're not capable of thinking. Now let's get things put right. Not just for disabled, for everybody. So we can all work in harmony together."

Bryan Dutton, Director General, Leonard Cheshire Disability said, "We want people to change the way they see disability, to think and act differently and to make a positive difference to the lives of disabled people.

"Disabled people experience unnecessary social barriers which are created largely through ignorance. In the twenty-first century it is unacceptable that such negative attitudes to disability still persist. Everyone has a part to play in creating a world in which disabled people are included in every aspect of life.

"Creature Comforts is well known and much-loved for its ability to bring home messages in a simple, everyday way. Our Creature Discomforts campaign builds on this, making a serious point with humour." Steve Harding-Hill, the Director of Creature Discomforts at Aardman Animations said, "Leonard Cheshire Disability's new campaign is an important step towards changing everyone's attitudes to disability. Working on it has been an amazing experience for us all at Aardman.

"Taking the real voices and experiences of disabled people and creating animated stories that are informative, entertaining and poignant has been an immense but incredibly satisfying challenge."

(courtesy The People Bulletin)

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