SIDS is Cute. AIDS is cool.

I generally have trouble comprehending a lot of contemporary visual style in Japan.  But from what I can gather, pulp generally wins the day, and the shocking stands out over neon.  That being said, I present two posters I recently saw in the clinic where my first nephew was born.  

SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) is cute. AIDS is cool. I'll gloss over any analysis of English mistakes in these posters, because that shit's played-out like a Jheri curl.  (The AIDS poster in particular seems to hilariously suggest that if I proceed into the hospital, I will enter some sort of zone where I could expose myself to AIDS.)

These posters represent the sort of wide-spread idiot proofing in Japan for which AC is partly responsible, as though people wouldn't pay attention to AIDS and SIDS unless public service announcements (in English no less) were accompanied by pretty pictures; as though people would have no idea how to get off the escalator if it weren't for the soothing, instructional voice.  

Forgive the pun, but I believe infantilizing SIDS and AIDS is a recipe for disaster.  Fortunately, very few people in Japan have AIDS, and no one will get AIDS unless African sex tourism suddenly becomes popular or a country where marijuana possession is punished with hard time suddenly becomes friendly towards intravenous drug use.  As for SIDS, don't put your baby to sleep on its stomach.  Easy, peasy, Japanesey.