In 2025, Hong Kong faced a fast-emerging public-health threat: etomidate, widely disguised under the street name “space oil”. By 1st quarter of 2025, it had become the most commonly abused drug among reported young drug abusers, with cases involving children as young as seven or eight.
Government first acted at policy level by formally replacing the glamorised “space oil” label with “etomidate”. But changing a name was easier than changing behaviour.
Traditional anti-drug publicity often stops at one familiar message:"Drugs are harmful. Don’t take them." Our breakthrough came from asking a different question: if young people already know drugs are harmful, why do they still try them? More than 70% identified peer pressure as a major driver. The real barrier emerged when a friend offered them drugs and saying “no” risked feeling awkward, uncool or isolating.
Instead of simply repeating the harms, we set out to reshape the social meaning of refusal. One person saying no can feel awkward; when a hundred say no together, it can become a trend. Our strategy was to turn Peer Pressure into Peer Power—giving young people a practical line they could actually use to refuse, then making that line so familiar, shareable and socially endorsed that saying no would feel normal, confident and even cool.
The ambition was to turn that refusal line into a citywide trend: one people would voluntarily post, remix and repeat online, until a government message became a shared cultural language and a citywide culture of saying no to drugs.
We started with one strategic task: give young people a line they could actually use to refuse drugs—and then make that line something everyone would want to say, share and own.
We created the playful slogan and gesture 「聽我講：一齊企硬唔take嘢!」, officially, “Listen to me: Let’s stand firm. Knock drugs out!”
The Cantonese was central to the idea. 「聽我講」 means “Listen to me”; 「企硬」 means to hold your ground and stand firm; and 「唔take嘢」 literally means something like “don’t take [it]”. In context, it means “don’t take drugs.” Its Cantonese-English mix made the line distinctively Hong Kong—more like something friends would say than a government instruction.
Breaking away from traditional public service announcements, we paired this hyper-local refusal script with a dynamic dance routine choreographed by pop icon Aaron Kwok, inspired by his classic hits and viral global trends. Every element was designed for participation: easy to say, dance, film, post, meme, adapt and remix. This was not simply a slogan to hear; it was a social script to use.
Our progression was:
Anti-drug message → Refusal script → Catchphrase → Trend → Culture.
But government cannot simply declare something a trend. We managed the campaign as a living cultural platform:
Government initiates → Citizens participate → Citizens create → The whole city amplifies.
As momentum grew, 28 government department mascots joined the campaign on the same day. This was more than a display of logos: 28 departments meant 28 approval flows, schedules and communication requirements. With shared creative guardrails and flexible coordination, all 28 mascots spoke with one voice—showing that “standing firm” was not just a Narcotics Division message, but a collective social norm across government.
Then the public took ownership. Social-media users created posts, videos, memes, jokes, tributes and adaptations of the slogan and gesture, turning a government-created refusal line into a shared language among friends.
Rather than controlling this creativity, we amplified it. The “Listen to Me” Creative Awards Ceremony celebrated contributions from netizens, artists, athletes and entertainers. By recognising public reinterpretation, government transformed audiences from passive recipients into co-creators—and gave the organic trend another reason to grow.
We also stayed agile when things went wrong. When an MTR advertising installation appeared visually misaligned and drew online criticism, we corrected it quickly, acknowledged the mistake and turned the incident back into the anti-drug message: “An ad gets a Take Two when it goes wrong. Take drugs, and life gives you no Take Two.” A potential PR crisis instead generated positive reactions and further adaptations.
The catchphrase soon spread across everyday social posts, television, radio, online programmes, concert stages and even the Hong Kong Film Awards—turning a government message into a citywide cultural language around drug refusal.
Crucially, this momentum was earned, not bought: zero paid influencers, zero paid celebrities and zero paid social-media boosting. The public did not simply receive our message. They became the media channel.
The campaign achieved 50M+ online reach and 1M+ interactions. On Instagram—one of the most popular platforms among young people—engagement reached 4.83%, nearly ten times the approximately 0.5% industry benchmark. Independent social-media analysis ranked it the highest-engagement Hong Kong Government public campaign since 2019.
This momentum was entirely earned: zero paid influencers, zero paid celebrities and zero paid social-media boosting. Yet it generated approximately HK$250M in earned media value and a 25.5x ROI.
More importantly, 「聽我講：一齊企硬 唔take嘢!」 became one of Hong Kong’s most recognisable catchphrases of 2026, appearing organically across social media, television, radio, online programmes, concerts and the Hong Kong Film Awards.
Behavioural impact mattered even more. Independent research found 97%+ greater determination to reject etomidate, while nearly 70% said the language made it easier to refuse a friend because it felt natural, humorous and cool. Around 89% showed increased willingness to report suspected drug-related cases, while searches for the anti-drug enquiry hotline “186 186” rose nearly threefold alongside campaign-related searches—strong signals that awareness was translating into action.
The campaign also extended prevention upstream. After “Listen to Me: Let's Stand Firm BB Class” launched, more than 50 kindergartens proactively approached the Security Bureau to participate. The Bureau subsequently incorporated the programme into its longer-term school strategy, showing the campaign created a platform for sustained preventive education.
Frontline anti-drug social workers also shared that the campaign gave them a new way to break the ice with young people, helping lower their guard and making conversations about drugs easier to start.
