Don't let your child buy that lie

MRS. SS, a mother of three young children aged 4 to 10 years, has a problem and seeks assistance from those who can help her. She says, "Coming from a conservative religious family background, I try to teach my children to respect family traditions. But see what happens.

"We as parents who struggle to raise good children in an evermore complex culture are now facing stiff competition from advertisers and marketers, and the competition is about to get stiffer and the stakes even higher.

This fierce competition goes well beyond our decisions to buy one product or another. It is a competition that will decide who will raise our children, who will determine their values and who will shape their characters. Whether we or them!"

"They tell our children to 'have it your way'. We struggle to teach our children how to restrain themselves. They tell our children to 'just do it.' We work hard to help our children understand that virtue and character matter. They tell our children that "thirst is everything, obey your thirst."

They have at their disposal multi-billion Rupee budgets and the skills of some of the most knowledgeable and inventive minds in the nation. We have ourselves, our overworked families, and our often-fragmented communities. Who can help us?"

I believe Mrs. SS has a valid point. Today's advertisers think nothing of stirring up our children's anti-social urges. They do not hesitate to use shocking and base humour to grab our children's attention.

As kids get to teenages and the desire for independence and rebellion raises its head, cool can become those things that are too edgy, too rebellious by many parents' standards.

In addition to the conventional TV, Radio and Press media, advertisers are colonizing every available space in the name of marketing; no place are off-limits with billions spent each year on advertising designed to promote explicitly anti-social values, particularly to children.

Many of the problems that beset Mrs. SS (and millions of other concerned young parents) arise from their children's obedience to these messages they receive. They are doing precisely what the ads tell them to do.

The children see such ads over your popular TV channel thousand times a month: a celebrity tells your child to drink a particular brand of milk to ensure vitality so that he can run a hundred metre length in three seconds to catch his school bus.

Another super-natural being advises your child to get wet in rain while eating ice cream in spite of her mother's advice because a special brand of balm is there to protect her. Another 8 years child becomes school's karate champion just because he uses a brand of concentrated yeast extract regularly.

These ads are everywhere, not only on TV, providing millions of young minds with what unfortunately has become a primary source of information. But, instead of helping, these ads are confusing and misadjusting young minds.

It is really sad to note that no child in our country is left wholly untouched by the influences of western pop culture. Advertisements displayed via all media are aimed to make them believe that if they only eat certain foodstuff, wear certain clothes, behave certain ways, they are considered 'cool'.

In developed countries, when potentially harmful advertisements are targeted at children and youth, the companies behind them can be sued and brought to justice.

However, a developing country like ours may lack the resources or the luxury to worry about such matters as there are often more pressing concerns.

But the final point is: should the parents any longer allow the advertisers to avoid their share of responsibility. In the competition for share of mind, parents seem to be losing. It's time advertisers begin to know that they cannot own others' children.

They should not be free to continue to pervert the children's values. They should not be permitted to exploit the children in their own homes. They should not be allowed to use the techniques of psychology to manipulate the children.

The Government should direct the Consumer Authority to initiate a broad-based rule making to protect children from harmful advertising and it should provide adequate funding to permit it to carry out this task with a sense of urgency for the well-being of our nation's children.

The most important point is that Mrs. SS need not be downhearted. She has the power to change the scenario. She does not have to be a passive victim.

If Mrs. SS can get together with other concerned parents, they can form a national organisation. They can boycott products whose ad campaigns promote harmful images and messages to the minds of children, write letters to advertisers expressing their concerns, take legal action against the advertisers and seek compensation... The options are limitless. They can indeed become a force to be reckoned with.