With only a handful of “fans” needed so I can secure a URL for PEM, Facebook showcases its behavioral marketing genius:

Ooh, I want to click that Get More Fans button!

If it’s hard for me to resist, can you imagine how a child’s underdeveloped brain reacts?

If you’re on Facebook, please consider joining — or asking a friend to join — Parents for Ethical Marketing. Don’t make me click that button.

Princess Culture Marches On at Gamine Expedition. The latest research and commentary by author Sara Grimes on princess culture and kids:

. . . the connections between princess-style narcissism and subjectivities of consumption is fascinating, by which I am referring to the bit about girls being taught that they are the “centre of the world” but also that their position as such is mediated through (or even dependent on) the consumption and display of commodity goods (clothes, accessories, etc.).

BPA Industry Manipulates Scientific Studies at MomsRising.org. It’s a sad truth: ” . . . anyone with an agenda can find research to support that agenda.” Sadder that industries fund “research” in order to continue meeting their profit margins at the expense of our health. Sound familiar, Minnesotans? Last year our Governor Pawlenty vetoed legislation to remove harmful chemicals from children’s toys based on his review of such research. Fortunately, then-President Bush signed federal legislation into law shortly after that.

New Legislation Regulates Tobacco Marketing. We’ll see how it is enforced. From The Center for Media and Child Health.

Are you on Facebook? So is Parents for Ethical Marketing! And did you know that you can start a discussion, post links, comments, and events and share your thoughts about marketing to kids on our Facebook page? Now, you can also read blog posts from Corporate Babysitter. It’s a great place to share with other members. Please join us!

Next month Diana: The People’s Princess exhibit will come to — where else – Downtown Disney Orlando.

Highlights include:

– Royal Doulton figurine of Diana in her wedding dress;
– Her magical royal wedding; and
– The historical significance of her role as Princess of Wales and the impact she had through that role on the fashion industry and charitable landscape.

Highlights will probably not include her battle with anorexia.

And if you haven’t yet, go to Dina Goldstein’s website to see her Fallen Princesses project. She explains:

The project was inspired by my observation of three-year-old girls, who were developing an interest in Disney’s Fairy tales. As a new mother I have been able to get a close up look at the phenomenon of young girls fascinated with Princesses and their desire to dress up like them. The Disney versions almost always have sad beginning, with an overbearing female villain, and the end is predictably a happy one. The Prince usually saves the day and makes the victimized young beauty into a Princess.

As a young girl, growing up abroad, I was not exposed to Fairy tales. These new discoveries lead to my fascination with the origins of Fairy tales. I explored the original brothers Grimm’s stories and found that they have very dark and sometimes gruesome aspects, many of which were changed by Disney. I began to imagine Disney’s perfect Princesses juxtaposed with real issues that were affecting women around me, such as illness, addiction and self-image issues.

Thanks to all who brought Fallen Princesses to my attention.

“I worry that even if Michelle and I do our best to impart what we think are important values to our children, the media out there will undermine our lessons and teach them something different.”

During his campaign, President Obama acknowledged that he is among the parents struggling against an onslaught of corporate marketing that hurts our children—and makes it harder for parents to parent.

Today, the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood sent a Father’s Day appeal to President Obama, signed by over twenty five hundred parents, petitioning him to launch a systematic review of the regulations on marketing to children to determine if they offer sufficient protection for twenty-first century families.  The petition, which was also signed by professionals who work with children and families, urges the President to direct the Federal Trade Commission and Federal Communications Commission to evaluate current policies to determine whether or not they adequately protect children.

Since the 1980s, when children’s television was deregulated and Congress restricted the Federal Trade Commission’s authority to regulate marketing to children, the amount of advertising and marketing targeting children has exploded in volume and sophistication. The digital revolution and increasingly miniaturized technology allow marketers today to expand their reach far beyond television and to insert their brands in children’s lives in ways that were inconceivable just a few decades ago.  Taking unfair advantage of children’s developmental inability to understand the persuasive intent of advertising messages, unregulated marketing is training children to be consumers rather than healthy, well-rounded citizens. Many parents felt strongly enough about the commercialization of their children’s lives that they added their own personal appeals to the letter. 

Read the rest of this entry »

Sarah Haskins does it again with Target Women: Lady Friends. Watch through to the end for an example of how girls are indoctrinated into the beautiful women-mindless consumers culture:

New research shows that kids are eating healthier in restaurants when given the choice, according to an article in the New York Times.

“The food industry is always saying, ‘We’re giving people want they want; that’s why we’re giving you chicken nuggets, burgers and fries for your kids,’ ” said Leann L. Birch, director of the Center for Childhood Obesity Research at Penn State. “That’s not really true. If kids are given different options and if parents make them available and let them choose some of those things, I think quite often we see you do get shifts in eating.”

So much for the old supply/demand argument when it comes to children’s marketing.

A letter-writing campaign to President Obama is being coordinated by CCFC to “direct the FTC and FCC to evaluate their current policies and regulations on marketing to children to determine whether or not they provide adequate protection for 21st century families.” There’s never been a better chance for our voices to be heard — please add your name. They’ll deliver the letters to the White House for Father’s Day. 

Nice link to Corporate Babysitter from NPR at Unsafe at any sip: Washington babies lose.

How many blogs have been neglected because of Twitter? Twitter has been a great way to get the word out since I have less time to blog, but I miss the depth and reflection that blogging allows. You can follow me @lisa_ray.

I would also like to snag a personalized Facebook URL for PEM, but we need 1,000 fans to do so. Methinks it’s a clever way to get smaller organizations to buy Facebook promotional ads; however, if you know of a Facebook user who would benefit from our news, please invite them to join.

From Daughters.com Making Her Own Movies:

There’s a delightful side effect, too. “When girls begin using media-making tools themselves, they get much better at being able to see the problems with popular media images,” says Mary Celeste Kearney, professor of feminist media studies at the University of Texas . . . .

Locally, TVbyGirls is offering some great summer camps for girls 12 to 18 which I personally recommend.

Finally, 50 Best Business Ethics Blogs includes yours truly.

My daughter has a passion for fashion.

You may recall that my bespeckled seven-year-old once told me that she would have a Bratz-themed party when I died.

She’s always been a bit more, well, girly than my older daughter. She wants to paint her fingernails. She wants to wear makeup. She wants her clothes to be “cute.”

I thought that a few more years with me as her mother would knock some sense into her. But recently I’ve realized that I’ve got a real problem on my hands.

First, she announced that she wanted to be a fashion designer when she grew up. And she began designing. Matching girl and pet outfits. And accessories.

A darling outfit! With lips everywhere! Titled — in case you can’t read it – “Boy Attraction Fashion!”

Blink. Blink. 

Look what the universe did to you, a friend of mine commented.

She’s always drawn strict distinctions between what boys are like and what girls are like. Recently she told me that she isn’t “100 percent girl” because she likes to be active.

Instead of exploding, I calmly asked her to clarify. We ended up having a long discussion about gender traits. To illustrate, I drew a line along a sheet of paper with “boy” on one end and “girl” on the other. Then I gave her some words and asked her to write them in the appropriate spot on the spectrum.

In the center — halfway between boy and girl, she placed smart, responsible, and funny.

Phew.

By boy she wrote fast, strong and active.

And by girl she wrote fashion and beauty. Beauty, she said, meant that you are beautiful.

Then she mentioned that there was one other characteristic you had if you were “100 percent” girl:

One-hundred percent girls are mean.

She has also told me, while looking in the mirror, that she thinks she is fat.

WHOSE DAUGHTER IS THIS?

Pretty strong evidence, I’d say, for a wider cultural influence than what is provided in the home. She very rarely sees commercial television. We don’t have cable. There are no women’s magazines — and affiliated ads — in our house.

Some of these tendencies are, of course, hard wired. It’s part of who she is. And these certainly aren’t the only thoughts that define her. But how, in this day and age, can she really believe these things?

And how can I help her see that these media-driven female stereotypes are, well, bullshit?

Before it’s too late?