Miss Lori asks, “Why are we advertising sex to kids?”
September 10, 2009 by Miss Lori
Filed under Body Image
There is just something about September that gets my blood boiling. September always drives home the point of how sexualized childhood has become. September means sexually charged billboards advertising the coming Television season. It also means newspaper circulars filled with ads for increasingly low cut and wildly inappropriate costumes turning young people into street walkers faintly disguised as cats, dogs and witches. For the last two years I have written passionately about concerns I have on the subject. In 2007 I wrote “Brittany, Lindsay Vanessa, Is your daughter next?” Last year I wrote “Miss Lori wants Gossip Girl to take a cold shower!”
This year is no better. This year our path to school is lined with billboards proclaiming “Love Sucks” over the bulging breasts of a young woman looking longingly into the camera, and “Tuesday is the New Hump Day” intermingled amongst two pouty lipped men, and the lithe woman sandwiched between them. Even worse, magazines on the store shelves show a kid favored Disney actor, naked and inquiring, “What are you looking at?”
That’s a great question. What are we looking at, and why do we even have to?! Why is there a war on my children’s innocence? Why is it not safe for my kids to ride down the street to school without having to be faced with advertisements that take their minds away from the wonders of childhood and directly to the salaciousness of adulthood. Isn’t growing up in this fast paced, take no prisoners World hard enough these days without planting landmines fueled with sexual content along the path of maturation? Yes, adults should be free to be titillated to their hearts content with advertisements bedraggled with double entendres and soft porn pictorials. I am not trying to stand in the way of their fun. However, we limited advertisements of alcohol and cigarettes to preserve the innocence of children. Shouldn’t we do the same with the sale of sex? Because, make no mistake, that’s what we are selling here, and our children are being forced to stand at the front of the counter while we do so.
SMILE On!
ML
Miss Lori can be found Musing from her Minivan at MissLori.TV , Wearetherealdeal.com and ChiacgoMomsBlog. You can also see her Activating to Be Great at Miss Lori’s CAMPUS on Youtube, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Excellent post. I always wonder which comes first: the demand for sex , or the marketing of sex. Marketers would argue consumers like it, demand it … but I’m not so sure.
Abercrombie is the worst offender, in my eyes — their ads are caterered to tweens and teens, and they SCREAM sex, and they’re not obtuse about it at all — it’s all out there, in plain sight.
It’s bad enough kids are developing sooner, but with these images, too … it’s no wonder kids are experimenting with sex in middle school … very sad, if you ask me. And I’m not even a mom yet!
Yes this gets me too. Even pretty mild magazines have racy ads in them. Family Circle…the name says it right? Yet they advertise woman under garments…hello I have a teenage boy in my home I would really like to keep as innocent as possible for as long as possible! No I am not naive, I am concerned that sex is so easily thrown around and casually shown. I have a pre-teen daughter that I want to have a healthy view of her body AND the right view of sex and its place. We have banned most magazines from our home because of this and canceled the few subscriptions I had to them a long time ago.
this sort of thing always makes me glad that I no longer live in the US. Not that everything about it is better here- before we got rid of our cable, if my kids happened to get up and turn on the tv before 6am (which never happened, but hubby and I are usually up at that time)- they would have gotten images of half naked girls rubbing themselves and talking about how horny they are, and how you should call them now- on EVERY damn channel. Not cool.
Advertising REALLY needs to be tamed- badly.
I remember several years ago when I still lived in the states and worked in the children’s department at Dillards- most of the clothing we had, I found myself wondering “what parent would let their kid wear this? My father would have killed me before letting me out the door at the age of 10 dressed as a trollop. Hell, the man got upset when I bought my FIRST bikini at the age of 18, and when I was sixteen he was upset that my prom dress was strapless. I don’t think he was a prude- just a dad with only girls- knowing that boys think about 3 things, food, sleep and sex.
We force our children to grow up too fast. Between the over sexualized society in which we live- to putting pressure on them to pick careers while they are still in elementary school, and taking away recess because we want them to have more classroom time to bring up test scores. Kids need the chance to be kids- to play with barbie, or climb a tree, or build a treehouse- and not have to worry about sex. My philosophy on sex is, if you don’t think you are ready to handle the potential consequence of sex- as in, a baby- you are not ready to have sex- no matter how safe or birth-controlled, since neither thing is 100% fool proof. I want my kids to make choices for themselves- and I want them to get to be young and innocent for as long as they can. We all have to grow up- but we have such a short time to be care-free. I want my kids to get the chance to enjoy it. I wish the world we live in wasn’t so keen to rob them of it all in the persuit of money (which is what it boils down to- who cares who we corrupt? sex sells, and I wanna be buried in my giant pile of cash, or swim in my cash vault, Scrooge McCDuck style)
Educational post! Well, this is starting to be global problem. Teenagers are now the important voice of society. Teens responds to sex. And marketing and advertising companies are taking this advantage to market sex. But who can blame them. They just want to make money like other companies and teens fancy sex, drugs and alcohol. Nevertheless, a form of control need to be in place or else their adds will only be filled with naked boys and girls covering only their private parts.
If this is not being monitor, children would be questioning about sex sooner and might go out trying it. Few years back there was a case of a 12 year boy caught asking his classmate for oral sex. Sad, I would say…
I, too, get confused by the fact that so many of the tweens I see seem to DEMAND THIS STUFF (?!) but it all circles back to the chicken/egg conundrum.
It saddens me that sex sells—but it does.
is it possible for us to do a complete advertising 180?
or is it like pandoras box and simply too late now that it’s out there?
I pray for the former and fear the latter.
Children are getting so many mixed messages about sex in this culture. We overexpose kids to the media fantasy that “girls gone wild” get attention and affection, then we expect results from sex education that can be summed up in three words: “just say no.” Under the Bush administration, funding for abstinence-until-marriage programs grew from $80 million in 2001 to $176 million in 2008. Personally, I hope the tide starts turning under the Obama administration.
Many girls I meet in my work tell me how they want to fit in, have the right body, the right look, and above all else, how much they crave love and acceptance. They see plenty of hot tub hookups on MTV’s The Real World. Meanwhile, the only education they get about sexuality in the real world comes in the form of warnings that sex is bad and wrong unless you’re married.
Instead of shaming young people when they don’t know how to act responsibly, let’s start teaching them (with age-appropriate programs) how to develop healthy relationships–at their own pace and on their own terms. Federal data shows that 95% of Americans have premarital sex, but in the last decade we’ve spent 100% of the federal sex education budget on abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. It’s a losing investment that calls for a reality check.
I don’t really have a problem with sex in advertising per see. I just think it’s a tired trick which shows lack of imagination. it’s rather how it is portrayed, which sometimes bothers me. It’s very plastic and often borrows imagery from soft porn. I’m not from the US and I’ve never really understood why a network like the CW uses sex so heavily to advertise series where you hardly see any action. When you’re from a country where every channel is like HBO you don’t really raise an eyebrow…it just feels like false advertising.
Miss Lori: Quite an image you used for this post, I would like to say not much shocks me these days —but man, this one is over the top.
My approach is to limit my children’s exposure to this crap (they are 6 and 9). We don’t have cable, which cuts out alot of this frivolity. Then, the kids need to ask to go on the web, the computer is where we can see what the are going, and we have parental controls in place.
I know they are being exposed to this anyway, this culture is so very sex driven, but I do think some of these measures help.
Then again, one stroll down Michigan Avenue in Chicago throws that whole theory out the window!
mV
Just a note: I’m pretty sure Corbin Bleu wouldn’t want to be referred to as a “Disney actor” in a promotion for a CW show aimed at an older audience. Being the only actor in the main cast not to do the shoot would send out a squicky “nudity is dirty” vibe, especially given that his pose is significantly less provocative than the poses of the women in the shoot. Corbin’s shot is very much “Yes, I’m nude. And?” Benjamin’s is more shy; “Why are you here? Where are my pants?” Sara’s pose is much more faux-shy (hands in front of genitals, but facing the camera head-on with sultry look) and Ashlely’s is a bit, “Uh-huh, I’m hot, you want this.”
I’m not arguing against your central point at all, but forever judging an actor by one role is a huge pet peeve of mine – especially in cases like this where the image isn’t particularly problematic. It’s one thing to protect the children, it’s another to demand that professional actors constantly market themselves with a previous audience in mind, regardless of what they’re currently working on. No one should be expected to remain a role model forever.
I see your point, but I think that the ubiquitousness and glorification of violence in the media is a much bigger problem. If I had teenaged kids, I’d prefer that they be having (safer) sex rather than committing acts of violence.
And, that picture is very easy on the eyes, I must say.
Great ad! Human body is a beautiful thing. I wish more people felt comfortable with theirs.
The human body doesn’t automatically imply sex. Moreover, sex isn’t dirty.
Anyone who thinks that this is inappropriate for children should keep their kids locked in a box. Don’t take them to an art museum. Don’t allow them into the library. Miss Lori, would you allow your child to take a life drawing class? How about an anatomy class? Do you want you’re kids to be innocent or just ignorant? Maybe you should try teaching your kids to think critically rather than to run and hide. They’re certainly old enough for that.
A few commentors have decried the dreadful American pop culture. I’d love to know where they’re living because it’s certainly not anyplace I’ve been. Americans are relative prudes compared to Europeans and we’re about on par with Canadians when it comes to sex. We do show much more violence which no one here seems to mind.
I was prepared to hate the “Love Sucks” ad. Although I’m not much of a prude about the human body, I’m not always as fond of coarseness and vulgarity. Then I found it was an ad for a show about vampires and the slogan is a joke and a pretty innocent one at that.
You seem to be looking to be outraged.
On a positive note: I’m really glad that you guys don’t censor comments. That’s really healthy, good and necessary.