Editorial: Stand up for good changes

Part of a newspaper's role is to promote and encourage positive change in the community.

In the coming months, you'll see two major campaigns from the Northern Advocate.

We are poised to launch an E Tu - Stand Up campaign that will encourage people to say "no" to gangs, and to say "yes" to more positive life choices, such as sport or culture.

Police have been instrumental in helping to set this campaign up and our hope is that it becomes a community campaign, publicised by local media but driven by the community.

We are working on E Tu because it is a proactive, positive campaign to change community attitudes towards gangs.

And we want to act now, rather than have to be reactive again when an organised crime outfit decides to set up their HQ in your street, or near your kids' school.

The second campaign you will see us working with the community on is suicide awareness.

Suicide is often regarded as a taboo subject. That lack of discussion is not helped by restrictive media rules which often mean that media ignore the subject rather than risk breaching rules or somehow contributing to a person's decision to take their own life.

However, there have been changes in the past few years to how media report suicide. In line with this, we intend putting together a publication that creates awareness about suicide, and spreading the message that it is okay to talk about it with someone that may be contemplating it, and that maybe even talking might save their lives.

This booklet and campaign will coincide with a Northland Rugby Union corporate boxing evening, that will be held to raise awareness about suicide.

These are campaigns about serious issues in our community, that we believe can make a difference. But they are not so serious that we regard them as being too dark or morbid to approach.

Both of the campaigns have good communication at their core, and are about taking good options in life. What could be more positive than that?