Hidden Dangers in Plain Sight

I’ve been saying for a really long time that television and movies and music and video games are screwing up the youth of this nation. Kids are exposed almost from birth to so much sex and violence and drug/alcohol use in all forms of media that the line between reality and fantasy, which is very blurred in young children, is staying blurred longer and longer. When we have 12 year olds shooting people to death and then going to school as if nothing happened, you know they can’t grasp the reality of the crime they committed. It’s as if they’re waiting for the person they shot to find the next health icon so they can get back up. Or at the worst, lose a life. But they don’t really expect it to be “Game Over”.

Advertising, the most common and most viewed medium in the country, is a multibillion dollar a year business. The impact advertising has on our daily lives is reaches far past simply our buying habits. Many products that were once (and in some cases still are) brand names are now the commonly used name for an item, like aspirin or band-aid. Many of us can recite advertising jingles from decades ago. “Two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun” is something almost everyone can identify with McDonald’s.  “Where’s the beef?” (used as a slogan by Wendy’s) was once used in situations where you didn’t get what you thought you were getting. Brand name recognition  is due almost solely to advertising.

But advertising also affects us in ways many of aren’t aware of. In many of her videos, Jean Kilbourne demonstrates the impact of advertising on women’s self-esteem and on attitudes towards women and minorities. I did my own “survey” of one issue of Cosmopolitan magazine and found more than 85 examples of how women and minorities are subtly told they’re not good enough as they are or that they’re “less than” or “beneath” white men. Even progressive magazines like “O” are not immune. Make-up and hair coloring are the most popular advertisements. By their very nature, they imply that women do not look beautiful enough without using them.

Now, according to an ABC story, rampant consumerism— which relies on advertising and is in fact the goal of advertising—is taking a heavy toll on the mental health of this nation. When acquisition of material goods is viewed as the highest goal, then personal relationships will suffer. And the most personal relationship you have is with yourself. If you don’t think you’re “good enough” because you don’t have a specific brand of jeans or you don’t own the latest gaming system or have some grey hairs showing or, God forbid, your mascara flakes off, then your self-esteem is going to suffer. And you’re going to keep beating yourself up until you get the things society says you need to be happy! The longer you beat yourself up, the lower your self-esteem will get and the harder it will be to find the happiness you’re seeking through the material items.

It saddens me that we live in a society where the love of money (and what it can buy) is stronger than the love of our fellow man.