poster of a girl

Comm 264

The Reality of Media

The media provide a false sense of “selection” within our allegedly “democratic” marketplace. The marketing of countless products, each essentially the same, provides consumers with an abundance of meaningless emotions and products to identify themselves. “If we had a media system that truly ‘gave the people what they want,’ commercialism would likely to be radically reduced (McChesney 165).” The brands presented by companies provide identity for consumers and encourage them to define themselves through those products. The exploitation begins from childhood when we are easily swayed by advertisements providing even less choice from the beginning and taking advantage of the inability to decipher advertising from regular programming. The threats of commercialism in media, namely the lack of actual choice, lie not only in our children, but also in our current democratic system.
The media give consumers what they, ultimately, lead them to believe they want. Barry Swartz refers to this as, “choice overload,” in which more actually feels like less—in this case the more choice we are supposedly given, the less choice we actually possess (Barber 140). The media do not allow the citizens to have a choice in which medium becomes commercialized—this has been evident in the eventual commercialization of the radio, television, and most recently, the Internet. Corporations keep the public out of their dealings as much as possible through closed-door meetings and secrecy. This smothers a citizen’s right to be informed as guaranteed under our democratic government. The industry does not allow citizens to make an educated decision about what is in their best interest. Therefore, reliance depends upon the industry to provide what it is that they supposedly “want.” The “needs” of consumers are based on the qualities or necessities that media provide them. The Internet has sped up the process of degrading sense of choice through mass pop-up advertisements and links that capture the viewer’s attention, in addition to the scanning of e-mail. These advertisements are targeted at a specific demographic in order to make it more personalized and individualistic. Some companies even invade our personal computer space by recording data from websites we visit and items we purchase, selling this information to other companies.
Within our culture, the media give forth the needs and wants of the consumer through planting the idea in their mind that, “Perhaps their life would be better or more enjoyable if they bought another product.” As Barber states in his book, “Identity becomes a reflection of a lifestyle…as well as attitudes and behavior linked to where we shop, how we buy, and what we wear, eat, and consume (Barber 167).” Consumers are looking to identify themselves with a particular style or category, most notably, the “in” group. The characterization, oftentimes, is not solely focused upon the product itself, but the feeling or implication of power, influence or image that it provides one. The advertiser plays on the emotional value the product supposedly supplies the consumer. An example would be Cheerios. The advertisement portrayed the concept of a Cheerio as a part of the family. It enhances the sentimental force of “family love” and advertisers hope this meaning will influence consumers (Barber 193). The feeling that the brand puts forth becomes the emotion the consumer seeks to identify with (McChesney 155). This method of advertisement becomes especially unethical when advertising is aimed toward children, who by nature, are more easily influenced.
In the essence of children, the advertising begins prior to their understanding of its concept or intention. The child has not yet developed their own values and consciousness of the images and programming they are consuming. “Children represent a vital market; in 2004, [it was predicted that] children under 12 in the U.S. would spend $35 billion of their own money (McChesney 163).” The amount of money children spend as consumers’ highlights them as a valuable target for advertisers seeking to increase their profitability. This is hazardous when adolescents begin their quest for identity, especially masculine and feminine identity because companies openly play on the adolescent desire to fit in with their peers. Youth tend to utilize specific products to create their own image, both how they view themselves and how they wish their peers to see them. This practice leads to the unhealthy confusion of what their identity actually entails. When image or self-identification is based on product consumption their use of these products can become unhealthy leading them to increase their consumption in order to find new identities to associate themselves with. For example, children may enjoy a particular cartoon in their youth and identify themselves as a fan of it, purchasing the paraphernalia associated with it to put in his or her bedroom. This display of the cartoon represents what that child finds important in life. As the child grows and develops into a pre-teen or teenager he or she may find him or herself identifying with another type of category, perhaps, music or clothing. The cycle continues long into their adult years, replacing brand after brand with reflections of the images or ideas that they identify themselves with. The idea stems as they are children and branches out as they grow into adults.
This has led and will continue to lend itself to a choice-devoid society, which actually undermines the laws of democracy. “The type of ‘democracy’ that grows out of our current commercially drenched culture—at its best—is one with little room for participatory governance (McChesney 167).” The only type of liberty citizens in our current democracy possess is to make a decision between the variety of comparable options provided to them by the media companies. The standard practice utilized by companies is to provide the consumer with an assortment of products that appear dissimilar in the emotion they promote, but ultimately the feeling is the same and one product is no different from the next.
Clearly, due to our current commercially oriented democratic situation, the ethical debate on the subject of advertising to children has been widely discussed. As Barber reveals in Consumed, “There is a youth ‘entry point’ which firms are seeking to exploit around the world (Barber 188).” In the case of Nickelodeon, the noncommercial network was quickly replaced by a commercialized one “in order to develop new programming (Montgomery 16).” The channel promoted itself to children through the television, movies, music, paraphernalia (dolls, accessories) as well as through the Internet. It encouraged children to further their experience with the network online where additional interaction and a flood of advertisements could take place. The catch being that the access to information was only granted to children after they had provided a significant amount of personal information often including age, phone number, and name, but certainly not limited to more personal questions such as the last gift they had received and from whom or the type of gift they would most like to receive (Montgomery 95). The possession of this information placed complications on the privacy of the children as consumers of the website. The practice proved especially exploitative because of the ability for one company to sell the child’s information to another company for profit. Obviously, the child’s sharing of information was often carried out without parental consent or even knowledge of the exchange. Also, companies put forth the disclaimer, “with parental consent” to bypass responsibility. This practice can be troublesome, especially because Internet access is highly unstructured and filtered even within the school/public library systems. In addition, it would be impossible for children to even comprehend the pathways their information traveled once put forth.
The regulation of children’s media is mainly pushed forth because of the activism of concerned parents and government officials looking to promote family values and “family friendly” images (Montgomery 57). The Children’s Online Protection Privacy Protection Act was enacted to offer safeguards on the amount and type of personal information that can be taken from children age 13 and under (Montgomery 217). This act sought to respect children’s right to access websites and interact within them without undermining their right to privacy and their protection on the ever-growing Internet. “The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act contained its own safe harbor provision designed to enable industry self-regulation to work hand-in-hand with government oversight (Montgomery 105).” In other words, it is an act of the industry to ensure that they are still able to market to children. However, those companies are still at the risk of government intervention and crackdown on policies. In this situation, companies simply must become more creative in their strategies to find loopholes in the relatively new system of regulation that has yet to be fully tested. The relationship between children and the company would require more eye-catching and engulfing marketing.
In 1998, the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (as mentioned above) attempted to put a limit on the amount and type of information that children would be required to put forth when interacting on websites. The policy was brought about mostly due to the public's concern for the obscene images and violence, oftentimes portrayed not only on the television screen, but also on the computer screen as well (Montgomery 35). Despite the dramatization of the obscene images children were supposedly being subjected to, the thought stuck in the minds of concerned parents and congressmen and women. Parents were afraid of the content their children were viewing without their knowledge. The solution—the V-chip which was introduced through the Communications Decency Act signed as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 signed by President Clinton. The chip was favorable to those promoting decency and “family value” within television. The V-chip was designed in order for parents to prevent their children from viewing content they deemed inappropriate. The problem with this chip was found in the lack of parental understanding that led to deficiencies in the usage of the V-chip. Many parents were not aware that their television even came with the chip despite President Clinton speaking at length about “television sets 13-inches larger that would have the new technology (Montgomery 43).” The parental lack of knowledge on this device and others such as the Internet allows children to take unmonitored control of the content they view. This leaves the violence, nudity, obscene language, and pornography in the hands of youth exposing them much too early to the inappropriateness of the world.
Similar to this, there have been several programs designed by software companies to aid parents in protecting their children from unwanted content on the Internet. These programs include SurfWatch, “one of the first products to ‘filter out’ inappropriate cyberspace content by matching Internet addresses with a list of forbidden websites (Montgomery 58),” and Cybersitter, which “protects against pornography, obscenity and hate speech” among other areas (Montgomery 58). The problem with these programs tended to be in the accidental blocking of informational content or Websites. In addition to this, some of the websites that were blocked were not actually offensive in any way. In attempting to regulate the content viewed by children, the programs ended up blocking useful and educational information. This is detrimental to the child’s ability to further their knowledge base, inhibiting their growth in important areas of self-awareness and intelligence.
Many consumer groups, like Commercial Alert, make certain that children are being treated fairly by corporations that are seeking to enhance their marketing relationship with youth. “Some advocates have called for a ban on all marketing to children…whether these proposals can pass constitutional muster remains to be seen, in light of the First Amendment freedoms granted to advertisers (Montgomery 220).” The granting of the First Amendment right to advertisers led to more deregulation of the industry which in turn led to more consumerism-oriented advertising campaigns which led to numerous choices that are not actually choices at all—these ad campaigns are frequently directed at children as well. Despite the supposed safeguards, the early age at which children are exposed to media influence can be problematic in that it creates a vicious cycle in which they grow into massive consumers. The conditioning of children at such a young age will eventually lead the culture to become even further engrossed in consumption, fueling their desire to define themselves through a myriad products.
On the other hand, television programs, with the assistance of their advertising counterparts, have chosen to promote various social causes to boost their public opinion (McChesney 159). This type of campaign can shed positive light on the corporations and foundations founding them while using children as the catalyst for social changes. The television network, MTV in partnership with the Kaiser Family Foundation worked to inform youth about their sexual health in their campaign entitled, “Fight for Your Rights: Protect Yourself (Montgomery 142).” This campaign, among others such as the truth campaign working against tobacco companies, seeks to “sell the issues as a brand (Montgomery 160).” In addition to these is the “Rock the Vote” campaign (also by MTV), which recruited several artists, musicians, and celebrities to encourage youth to vote and participate in local and national politics. The appeal of the celebrities was meant to entice and motivate youth to participate in local communities—also, to make them feel “cool” in doing so. The object was to take the marketing strategies developed for the advertising of products and apply them to the social issues that were in need of attention. Another consumer strategy was to take advantage of the emergence of the Internet and youth taking on a new role of producers. By allowing teens to become involved actively with the campaigns more evidence of its effectiveness became evident.
Children’s consumption of media may prove to become a threat to capitalism as well, in the manner that capitalism cannot be found where there is real need due to the fact that it hinders profit. Consumers will continue to buy the products they believe they need until they have reached the point where they may no longer be able to afford these luxuries. They will need to focus less on material objects and more on essentials such as food or water. This will hinder the capitalistic ventures of our economy in that their profit will decrease. The needs of consumers will be similar to those facing other countries and peoples within the world. Presently, the actual necessities that should take top priority are being largely ignored. For example, this is evident within the context of Africa and their problem in obtaining the mosquito net. As Barber states on page 318, “…even an item as cheap as a mosquito net is beyond the means of those who most need it.” If a company were wiling to take a risk and invest in providing for this demographic they could improve on the lives of many while producing minimal profit. Unfortunately, the problem with this proposal lies in the fact that the moral obligation of the company does not overpower their desire to increase profit. The improvement of the lives of thousands is not deemed imperative enough to take such a risk. The solution to this lies in the ability to make these items profitable for the capitalists so that those items are provided for those who desperately require them. Therefore, capitalistic ventures may ultimately harm themselves. When the “needy” become the majority because of the amount they consume, companies will be forced to provide the necessities not the luxuries.
The most important aspect, we as citizens, should focus on is the reassessment of the funding of the media by corporate sponsors (McChesney 174). There must be change inflicted upon the policies of the media and their goals of marketing and research regarding children. As long as we allow our children to be consistently exploited, the future will become much more detrimental to children. Either they will be forced to grow up and understand concepts of obscenity or pornography earlier in their development, or they will become apathetic to the choices they are given. They will have to begin to understand the choices they are being given by the commercially driven media system are hardly different from each other. This will threaten the democracy we are under at the moment as well.
The effect of the media’s influence over our society has the possibility to be altered. The citizenry must take charge of their consumption habits and rethink the items they purchase. They must replace these unnecessary commodities for those that are truly imperative to their lives. “Ultimately, it will take a combination of government policy, responsible industry self-regulation, public education, and activism to ensure that marketers treat young people fairly in the Digital Age (Montgomery 220).” The governmental tendency to be swayed by the interests of the media corporations is a major dilemma within the realm of commercialism. As citizens, we must educate ourselves and fight for our children’s right to be unexploited. In addition, we must fight for our own right to be provided with legitimate choices without the manipulation and harassment of the advertising industry’s conniving and self-interested behavior.
Works Cited
Barber, Benjamin. Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole. New York and London: W.W. Norton & Company. 2007.
McChesney, Robert. The Problem of the Media: U.S. Communication Politics in the 21st Century. New York: Monthly Review Press. 2004.
Montgomery, Kathryn. Generation Digital: Politics, Commerce, and Childhood in the Age of the Internet. London and Cambridge: The MIT Press. 2007