Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Don't blame advertising

Yesterday the National Union of Teachers launched a study attacking advertising and its supposed effects on young people. The union has utterly missed the point. Let's look at one example:

"There is a disturbing trend for pre-teenage girls to wear sexually provocative clothes and make-up."


Adverts selling sexually provocative clothes and make-up to children would, if they truly outraged the parents, be a terrible idea. Companies go to considerable lengths to build a positive public image and spend large amounts of time and money on corporate social responsibility and other such measures. The outraged parents have every ability to prevent their children shopping in those stores so the market would be small - restricted to those children sufficiently smarter than their parents that they can fool them - and not worth the public relations disaster.

Parents are only pestered because their will to resist their children is obviously weak - because they have no credibility that they will resist the pestering.

Parental will is weak because of relativism. Though they want the best for their children they feel guilty about placing any stricture upon their behaviour. They have spent a lifetime being told that to be judgemental is the worst kind of sin. In the adult sphere they are expected not to tolerate every moral choice but to go way beyond that bar and treat them as equal.

As a result they don't feel at all credible themselves when confronting their children and telling - for example - their nine year-old that dressing like Christina Aguilera isn't remotely appropriate. The language of 'appropriate' and 'inappropriate' feels archaic. When facing a pestering child parents who have lost the very idea of right and wrong have no answer to their claims that standing out will be inconvenient. They will choose the path of least resistance. As so many have chosen that path of least resistance being the exceptional parent becomes ever more difficult.

Increased commercialism isn't the important trend at work in the sexualisation of children or childhood obesity. Advertising is a product of the society around it and ours has a very hard time really condemning the sexualisation of children and treats those without the willpower to control their weight as victims. Laws to curb advertising are a lazy response to a serious issue and completely miss the point. They are an attempt to find a policy lever to address a problem created by cultural and intellectual change.

6 comments:

Ruthie said...

"Parental will is weak because of relativism. Though they want the best for their children they feel guilty about placing any stricture upon their behaviour. They have spent a lifetime being told that to be judgemental is the worst kind of sin. In the adult sphere they are expected not to tolerate every moral choice but to go way beyond that bar and treat them as equal."


I agree.

That said, I think some advertising aimed at young girls is REALLY APPALLING-- for example, when I was pregnant, someone got me a subscription to a baby magazine. Routinely, on the cover on in the ads inside, I'd see pictures of little baby girls and baby toddlers wearing bikinis (!!) and belly-baring tops (!!!). Who on earth puts their 2-year-old in a bikini?

Also, I recognize that U.S. and U.K. advertising are probably different, but this is a fantastic video by a woman who's done a whole series on advertising and its view of women:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1993368502337678412

It's about 30 minutes long, but well worth it. I might post it on my blog sometime.

Dave Cole said...

That's a very interesting post, Matt. The relativism might well have legs.

Do you think that advertising, generally, is effective?

xD.

Matthew Sinclair said...

Dave,

Its a good question. I'm not sure it is easy to generalise but broadly I'd say that it ties in to brands. As such, its a quality (quality in the broad sense of whatever people like) distinction between brands and grabs market share rather than growing the market. I could be wrong though.

My key point in this post is that advertising to children is effective if parents let it be effective. For some of the awful examples Ruthie cites they shouldn't let it.

Dave Cole said...

I agree with you, I think; advertising to children works because of pester power. I would say, though, that (having looked after children from time to time) that pester power grinds you down. Indeed, Guantanamo might replace waterboarding with a five-year-old who really wants an ice cream.

Given that there are a significant number of parents that are not able to sufficiently resist pester power, would a restriction on advertising to children be appropriate?

Matthew Sinclair said...

Dave,

No, I absolutely wouldn't support a ban. There are a hundred different sources of inspiration for infant pestering. From parents drinking to peers to the characters in actual TV programming. Parents need to be able to resist pester power when it will do their children harm. Restricting advertising will further the impression that they have no such duty. It might actively harm the chances of the situation improving.

Good question though.

Best,
Matt

Dave Cole said...

"Parents need to be able to resist pester power when it will do their children harm. Restricting advertising will further the impression that they have no such duty. It might actively harm the chances of the situation improving."

I agree wholeheartedly on the first point. I question the second, as the duty of care already has particular laws in place to supplement it. My contention is more that parents who can resist pester power will do so anyway and it **might** help those who cannot.

Sorry if this makes no sense - I'm knackered.