When You Don’t Know What to Do in Safety, Dress it Up

So often we see Safety grasping at any medium to present its traditional message.

Rather than ask ‘why did the last strategy not work?’, Safety doesn’t do that. Instead, it thinks the medium is the problem NOT the message and so, looks to dress up the medium by making it entertaining, ‘sexy’ (https://safetyrisk.net/safety-isnt-sexy-and-it-shouldnt-be/) or somehow unusual.

We see this with the Punk Rock Safety podcast that thinks traditional safety with a few swear words thrown in, is the way to dress up traditional safety. In the end, it’s just the same old stuff with plenty of self-indulgence, mockery and swearing. But it’s all about traditional safety, there is no shift in paradigm (https://safetyrisk.net/without-change-in-paradigm-there-will-be-no-sustainable-change-in-safety/) or agenda. It’s all Safety knows what to do.

And in the end, like many safety podcasts, the selection of repetition in safety ‘noise’ leads to desperation, boredom and repeat on the rinse cycle. One wonders how long people can sustain the same message on repeat for so long?

I saw this one lately using Star Wars as a medium (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5OiNqtyIYg) to get over the same old tired stuff: hazards, controls, PPE, controls and hazards and, hazards, controls and PPE. Throw in some clips from Star Wars and somehow the message will ‘stick’? I still wonder how you can put so much Stars Wars IP in a clip and not be up for a law suit?

Again, no paradigm shift, no alternative, just traditional safety packaged in a supposedly different medium. Apparently, slips, trips and falls are events of ‘galactic proportions’. Really? Could you make a sillier statement? And, that is just the start.

Of course, why was Star Wars chosen as the medium. Because the myth of the hero is what Safety loves. And it’s all fiction.

When it comes to Safety, the hero tells you what to do. The hero wins the day. The hero does what’s right. The hero is Safety. There’s no doubt about it, when it comes to safety there is no more loved medium than the hero (https://safetyrisk.net/indiana-jones-and-the-hero-myth-in-safety/). Indiana Jones indeed.

And who is the ‘Galactic Safety Inspector?’ self-pronounced Rachel Houseman (48 seconds into the clip). And regardless of attempts at humour, the underlying semiotic is the hero myth. The message is just more ‘telling’ and the same old safety tradition. And of course, safety observations are ‘imperial’.

Have you heard enough? After all, a video of traditional safety is just more telling of traditional safety. And there it is with 45k subscribers, affirming what Safety loves most, more of the same. More telling, repetition of more telling, wrapped up in a medium that disguises more telling. So often condescending, patronising and bundled up as ‘professional’.

If you are interested in a different view to traditional safety there is a positive alternative, that involves a positive paradigm shift. If you want to know more about this alternative:

You can download free books here: https://www.humandymensions.com/shop/

You can do the free Introduction to SPoR here: https://vimeo.com/showcase/4233556

You can email for coaching here: admin@spor.com.au

You can watch free videos here: https://vimeo.com/cllr

Or you can come to the SPoR Convention in September: https://spor.com.au/spor-convention-2025/

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Dr Rob Long

Expert in Social Psychology, Principal & Trainer at Human Dymensions

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PhD., MEd., MOH., BEd., BTh., Dip T., Dip Min., Cert IV TAA, MRMIA Rob is the founder of Human Dymensions and has extensive experience, qualifications and expertise across a range of sectors including government, education, corporate, industry and community sectors over 30 years. Rob has worked at all levels of the education and training sector including serving on various post graduate executive, post graduate supervision, post graduate course design and implementation programs.