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January 27, 2005

TV ads and parental responsiblity

Mark Kleiman has a post in which he argues that television adversiting aimed at children should be regulated.

It's not a question, it seems to me, of whether some particular pitch for sugared cereal is "deceptive" and therefore an "unfair trade practice." It's a question of who ought to have control over what messages children are exposed to. Commercial speech directed to children is simply not on a par with the content of newspaper editorials, or even with the content of soap operas, in terms of either First Amendment jurisprudence or of the underlying policy considerations.

Television is, for better or for worse (I'm convinced it's very much for worse, but conviction doesn't make me right) a central part of the lives of American children. Children who do not watch television, or watch only the programs you and I might like them to watch -- children, in particular, who never watch advertising-supported television -- are cut off from the culture of their peers, which is an uncomfortable and otherwise disadvantageous position. It is therefore wrong to argue that advertisers should be allowed to put on whatever ads they want as long as parents have the right t turn off the set.

Parents shouldn't have to decide to cut their children off from the culture of their peers in order to protect them from being sold various forms of junk, or be put in the position of being the bad guys as they attempt to police their children's television-watching.

While I agree that there are serious problems with advertising aimed at children, I don't think that goverment regulation is the way to solve the problem.

In all honesty, I think the best solution to the bad-advertising problem is for parents to learn to say "no" to their children and actually mean it. Yes, when a child wants something, they can be extremely persistant - even to the point of throwing a temper-tantrum - but giving in to the child only serves to teach them that you don't always mean it when you say "no" and that if they push hard enough, they can get you to change your mind. This is one way children get spoiled.

Parents today are too often afraid that if they say "no", their children won't "like" them as much. Boo hoo. You're a PARENT. Having your kid not like you all the time comes with the territory. If you teach a child from an early age that when you say no, you mean it, and that even throwing a temper-tantrum won't change your mind (which can be done by just letting the kid scream and cry until they're burned out while you do your best to ignore it), that child will grow up being much less likely to throw tantrums, beg, plead, wheadle and otherwise try to push you into changing your mind, because they'll know there's no point in doing so.

But back to Mark's argument that cutting children off from the advertising by restricting what they watch on TV is unfair because it cuts them off from their peer's culture. It seems to me that he's saying that a child who isn't into whatever's currently popular on television is going to be at a disadvantage. And maybe it would be somewhat awkward - at least initially - but I don't know that that's necessarily a bad thing.

What we're really talking about here is peer pressure - only instead of the kids giving in, it's the parents. Rather than sticking to their guns and keeping their kids from doing something they don't feel is in their children's best interests, the parents are letting what OTHER families do set the rules for them. Not only does this mean that children end up exposed to messages the parents many not want them to be exposed to, but it also means the kids don't learn that it's OK not to go along with something just because "everyone else does it". Kids who learn early on that it's OK to be different from their peers - to not have the same interests or do the same things - are more likely to be able to resist peer pressure later on when the stakes - drugs, alcohol, smoking and sex - can be so much higher.

Yes, it may be awkward for a child to not be conversant in "SpongeBob SquarePants" or the other popular shows of the day, but remember that we're only talking about TV shows here. There are many other cultural areas where a child who is restricted from certain TV shows can still find common ground with their peers - music and books (such as the "Harry Potter" and "Lemony Snicketts" series, which tend to be quite popular with children) being two big ones.

This whole issue reminds me of a story I heard several years ago on the local news. Some kids from one of the nearby high schools were going to have a big party, with alcohol being served. The parents of the kids were not only aware of the party, they were providing the booze. One girl's mother didn't want her to go because she didn't want her to be at a drinking party, but after several other parents called her, complaining that she was "ruining" the party for their kids by not letting her daughter go, she relented. Late into the party, the kids started driving a car around in the yard, and the girl was injured.

The girl's injury is why the story made the news, but what struck me was that this mother had gone against her better judgement and given in to the peer pressure she got from her fellow parents - who apparently were ok with their underaged children drinking. She decided that it was more important that she and her daughter "fit in" with their peers than it was to uphold the law, keep her daughter safe or teach her daughter that she doesn't have to go along with something just because it's the "in" thing.

Children today don't need the government stepping in so that their parents don't have to make hard decisions. Kids need their parents to BE parents - to say "no" when they think something isn't in their child's best interest and to have the child respect that. Parents need to be the ones who decide what messages their children are exposed to - that's a fundamental part of a parents job! They need to be able to teach their kids that it's OK to be "different" from people around them and that you don't always have to like everything your friends like in order to be accepted. They need to teach them that it's OK to not do something "everyone else" is. They need to risk having their kids get mad at them for not giving in all the time. In other words, sometimes they NEED to be the "bad guys". It's called "discipline", and kids today need a lot more of it.

There are too many areas where we seem to expect the government to step in and regulate something "for the good of the children" so that parents won't have to regulate it themselves - and that's not good for the children at all. They don't learn any discipline, and they don't learn how to deal with not getting what they want - and that doesn't bode well for the future at all.

Posted by thorswitch at January 27, 2005 06:30 PM

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