IS ADVERTISING KILLING OUR VALUES?
With the Christmas season well upon us I stumbled across this vitriolic attack on advertising and its detrimental effect on children by the Guardian.
According to some research done by National Consumer Council, 70% of three year olds don't know their own surname but can recognise the golden arches of MacDonalds.
THe Compass Thinktank estimates that your average child in the UK, US or Australia is exposed to 20,000 to 40,000 TV ads per year.
And as the ultimate proof of the power of brand culture, children named after brands themselves - researchers came across 300 Armanis, a number of L'Oreals and even an ESPN!
The effects of this exposure has been summarised by the Guardian as follows:
Not only are children being made miserable by a philosophy which suggests you can find happiness only through endless material consumption, but this commercialisation is shaping all our futures. People brought up as super-consumers and brand addicts will carry this unsustainable culture into the next half-century.
Check out the full article here and also the interview with Mark Holden, Executive Planning Director whose views are a bit at odds with the Guardian.
Bearing in mind this is the industry that some of us work in and some of us want to get into, do you agree that advertising is killing our values as a society? How can we make changes to how we market products and services to ensure we avoid rotting the minds of children?