Human rights activists have criticized the British Ministry of Defense for luring weary 16-year-olds with the prospect of a military career at moments when they are “vulnerable” in attempt to cut recruitment shortfalls.
The British Army has run paid Facebook ads on and around the day when the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) grades were announced, offering the teens a career in the military if their academic results didn't turn up as hoped, according to the Guardian reports. The response to the parliamentary request by MP Liz Saville Roberts has revealed that the British Ministry of defense spent £1.7m on social media ads between 2015 and 2017, most of which were run on the Facebook.
The newspaper specifies one of the commercial Facebook messages, dated August 2015, when the scores are revealed.
“No matter what your results will be, you can still improve yourself in the army,” the ad read. It featured a photo of happy-looking men in soldier's uniforms.
Rachel Taylor, the director of programs at an NGO named Child Soldiers International, which fights the military exploitation of young men worldwide, called targeting teens around exam results day with “idealized and unrealistic” ads “shameful.”
“Targeting army advertisements at teenagers when they are stressed and vulnerable is abhorrent. These adverts prove once again that the MoD is deliberately targeting children at the lowest limit of the legal recruitment…
