Canada

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Quebec Minister of Justice launched an awareness campaign with TV commercials encouraging viewers to ask themselves whether they really are open to sexual diversity. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO

A public display of affection between a couple shouldn't usually elicit a reaction from people.

But what if those engaging in that passionate smooch are a same-sex couple?

The Quebec government has launched a unique advertising campaign designed to get the province thinking about just how open-minded it really is when it comes to homosexuality.

The TV, radio and web campaign shows routine, everyday scenes in which the viewer has no idea until the end that the ad is about sexual orientation.

One shows a man texting his lover while awaiting him at the airport.

Then a man and woman exit simultaneously past the arrivals door. In the end, the woman brushes past and the two men join in a deep kiss.

Another ad shows a woman returning home to find a note from her partner. She is caught off-guard by a surprise party with a group of friends where she and her partner, a woman, share a passionate embrace.

In both cases, at the end, a narrator asks the viewer: "Does this change what you were thinking 20 seconds ago?"

The ads were developed by Cossette Communications in Quebec City over the past year. They're part of a $7.1 million, five-year anti-homophobia campaign by the provincial government.

The idea was not necessarily to shock the viewer but to get people thinking about how open-minded they really are, said Martine Delagrave, who oversaw the project for the ad firm.

"We learned in our research that Quebec is viewed as open to sexual diversity, but homophobia still exists and it still exists in Quebec," she said.

"Our idea for a first campaign was to shed some light, to have some awareness about how open we really are."