Vice Advertising - Essay Example

Vice Advertising Advertising is the essential activity required for the success of a product or service in the market. Even better quality products may fail in the market in the absence of proper advertising. Same way, even cheap quality products may excel in the market with the help of misleading advertising methods implemented by the advertisers or marketers. Children and teens are extremely vulnerable to misleading advertisements because of their inability to segregate between the good and evil. Governments, parents and sociologists should take proper actions against unhealthy or misleading advertisements in order to save future generation. This paper analyses the problems associated with unhealthy advertising to children and teens and proposes certain solutions to avoid it. Tobacco companies exploit the hero-worshipping attitudes of younger generation cleverly with the help of beautiful ads and children and teens become the victims of such misleading ads. Smoking often causes lung cancer, heart diseases, asthma, cough etc. Instead of revealing these health problems of smoking, tobacco companies in their advertisements describe smoking as a pleasant act which gives immense satisfaction and pleasure to the smoker. Majority of the tobacco companies have celebrities as their brand ambassador. For example, tobacco companies often utilize film stars for advertising their cigarettes. The mannerisms and the body languages of the film stars in the tobacco advertisements will encourage the hero-worshipping teen generation to imitate their heartthrobs blindly. Children and teens have the inherited trait to imitate others. They learn life lessons from parents, teachers and celebrities. They are not much aware of the consequences of smoking. Only thing they know is that their hero is smoking and therefore they can also smoke. Thank You for Smoking is a 2005 comedy film which portrays the efforts of a person to promote cigarettes using heavy spin tactics while also trying to remain a role model in front of his child (Thank You for Smoking). People usually demonstrate many faces in their social, personal, family and professional lives. A loyal husband in personal life need not be the same in his social life. Same way, a good parent in family life need not be the same in his professional life. People usually forced to do many things even though they are not much interested in it. Circumstances force people to engage in unpleasant behaviors. For example, even nonsmoking film stars forced to act like a smoker in many films. This is because of their professional commitments. Even though they are against smoking, their characters in films may encourage millions of children all over the world to engage in smoking like unacceptable behaviors. There is no point in arguing that these celebrities are against smoking as their fans are unaware of it. According to MacMillan (2009), “Children are routinely exposed to a variety of media that arent specifically aimed at them” (MacMillan). It is extremely difficult to keep children away from advertisements which are designed for adults. For example, Viagra is a medicine intended to treat sexual impotence. US-based pharmaceutical company Pfizer introduced this revolutionary product in the market to treat sexual dysfunction and also erectile problems among men. Pfizer marketed this product with the help of so many attractive television commercials intended for the adult community. An ad labeled the “Power of Viagra” portrays how Viagra helped an old male to catch the attention of a young female (Viagra Best Commercial). It is not necessary that only this advertisement may catch the attention of only the adult community. In fact children during their developmental stages are more vulnerable to sex related materials because of the growth of sex hormones during adolescence. After watching above ad, children may try to use Viagra for improving their sexual energy. However, Viagra is not designed for children and it may cause more harm than good to the younger people. There are many teenagers who are suffering from hair losses. Plenty of drugs are available in the market that claims that hair regrowth is possible. Rogaine, propecia etc are some examples. In fact medical studies have proved that propecia has the ability to stimulate the growth of female hormone or estrogen. Teenage boys who take propecia quite regularly may develop hormonal imbalances. Alcoholism is another problem associated with unhealthy advertisements. As in the case of smoking, liquor manufacturers also advertise their products as safe to use. It should be noted that alcoholism could create more problems to the teenage community than adult people. Children during their physical and mental developmental stages need nutritious food and a healthy lifestyle. However, liquor manufacturers encourage younger generation to start drinking habits as early as possible with the help of misleading advertisements. “Alcohol advertisements often portray alcohol as enhancing economic success, fun, attractiveness to the opposite sex, athletic skill, and social popularity” (Alcohol Advertising Restrictions). It should be noted that children during their adolescence might do anything possible to attract opposite sex because of the development of sex hormones. Liquor manufacturers know this fact very well and they will advertise alcoholism as a short cut to reach or attract opposite sex. Many teenagers started drinking habits because of such misleading advertisements. Fast food industry is another villain responsible for vice advertising. The concerns about obesity related health problems are growing day by day. Children are extremely vulnerable to fast foods as they often trapped by the attractive advertisements of fast food advertisers. The ingredients used to make fast food tastier may create huge health problems to the consumers. It should be noted that current generation is increasingly reluctant in doing physical workouts. They spend lengthy hours in front of televisions or computers. After a busy workout at workplace, people usually show little interest in doing exercises which cause more fatigue. They want to spend their leisure time in front of the computers or televisions. During such leisure time, they like to consume fast foods and that also more than what is actually required by their bodies. Fast food manufacturers know this habit very well and they always try to spread the slogan; leave kitchen and take shelter in restaurants. Another major matter of concern associated with vice advertising is the legal protection enjoyed by the advertisers. Even the Supreme Court of America ruled in favor of the vice advertisers recently. The Supreme Court ruled recently that a complete ban on truthful, non-misleading commercial speech" is almost always unconstitutional. There is no "vice exception" to the 1st Amendment that would allow a "paternalistic" government to restrict advertising for lawful but suspect products. These range from alcohol and lottery tickets to casino gambling and topless dancing. The 1st Amendment directs us to be especially skeptical of regulations that seek to keep people in the dark for what the government perceives to be their own good (Fong, p.21). In a world which is controlled increasingly by commercialization, the Supreme Court’s decision is not much surprising. In a heavily competitive globalized world, countries and organizations are struggling hard for survival. Under such circumstances nobody wants to avoid the revenue generated by tobacco, alcohol, casinos, lotteries or narcotic drugs. Advertising is the activity which helps companies to communicate directly or indirectly with the customers. Courts always give its verdicts based in the constitutional laws. If the administration is sincere in its effort to block the spreading of products and services such as tobacco, alcohol, narcotic drugs, lotteries, casino etc; it has to make amendments in the constitution so that courts will give its verdicts against unlawful advertisements in future. However, administration is not ready to do so even though it speaks volumes about the necessities of preventing vice advertising and harmful products. “How information is framed matters. People weigh losses more heavily than gains. They will typically bet on a coin toss only if their potential winnings are twice as big as the amount they stand to lose”(The New patternalism). It should be noted that majority of the smokers usually avoid the health warnings shown in cigarette advertisements. This is because of the peculiarities of framing information in such advertisements. For example, in many of the tobacco advertisements, celebrities act like feeling comfort after taking a puff. While watching the acting of the celebrity, nobody will notice the statutory warning demonstrated at a corner of that advertisements using microscopic (too small) fonts. In other words, vice advertisers are smart enough to bypass the statutory requirements. Even if the authorities know this, they are not much sincere in preventing such bypassing of statutory warnings in advertisements. Collective efforts from the government, sociologists and parents are necessary to save younger generation from misleading advertisements. It is a statutory requirement everywhere in the world to display the statutory warning, “smoking is injurious to health” on all tobacco advertisements. However, tobacco companies display this warning in small letters and therefore people may not notice it. Government should revise the statutory warning law with respect to tobacco advertising. Instead of asking tobacco companies to display this warning in all tobacco advertisements, government should ask the tobacco companies to display this warning as big as possible. Consumer advocates are calling for regulation that would make children off-limits to fast-food marketers, much as they are to alcohol and tobacco companies. "The food and restaurant industry needs to be responsible in how they market to children or else the government will step in and then require them to," says Dr. Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy at the Washington-based Center for Science in the Public Interest. (MacMillan). “Health advocates complain that simply telling kids theyre too young to smoke, without explaining why adults shouldnt smoke either, merely enhances tobaccos appeal” (Fong p.9). Many parents have the habit of advising their children to stay away from smoking and drinking citing health reasons. However, they are not much interested in obeying these principles in their personal life. In fact they smoke and drink in front of their children irrespective of what they advised to their children. Thus children get wrong messages about smoking and drinking from their parents. A parent who advices his child with respect to smoking or drinking, should show the way through his/her personal life. Children usually have a habit to imitate their parents. Parents can capitalize on such traits and prevent their children from becoming the victims of vice advertising. Parents should monitor the activities of their children continuously and they should try to provide enough counseling to the children with respect to the dangers associated with misleading advertisements. Sociologists and parents also have a major role to play in protecting teenagers from misleading advertisements. Sociologists, with the help of school authorities should conduct awareness classes in school campuses to educate the children about the traps in advertisements. For this purpose, sociologists should seek the services of celebrities as celebrities can influence the fans very much in changing their behaviors. For example, a call against smoking and drinking from David Beckham or Angelina Julie may force millions of their fans to stay away from such habits. As vice advertisers exploit the fame of celebrities for selling their products, sociologists should seek the services of same celebrities to counter attack the efforts of vice advertisers. Government should form an advertising regulatory body to check the claims of advertisements. Misleading or unhealthy advertisements should be prohibited. Advertisers should be made liable to the claims described in their advertisements. Strict penalties should be enforced on advertisers who deliberately try to mislead the people. Moreover, government should think seriously in terms of making changes in the constitution so that courts may handle vice advertising cases more effectively in future. To conclude, misleading advertisements encourage teenagers to use unhealthy products. Smoking and alcoholism are often promoted with the help of misleading advertisements. Government should strengthen the laws with respect to advertising and promotions. Sociologists and parents should provide enough counseling to the teenage community about the dangers associated with advertisements. It should be noted that leading a healthy life is a natural right to everyone and activities like vice advertising actually denying them that right. Works Cited Fong, Valerie. “Composition and Reading”. 2011. Web. 07 February 2012 MacMillan, Douglas. “Alcohol, Then Tobacco. Now Fast Food?”. 2009.The Business Week. June 30, 2009. Web. 07 February 2012 “The New patternalism”. 2006. The Economist. Apr 6th 2006. Web. 07 February 2012. “Thank You for Smoking”. 2005. Web. 07 February 2012. “Viagra Best Commercial”. 2007. YouTube. Web. 07 February 2012. Read More