Drop everything and go immediately to join CCFC’s letter-writing campaign to tell toy makers to stop targeting kids this holiday season. I know the economy has already caused riffs in our home about what we can afford — and my kids rarely see televison commercials.

. . . Even though experts predict parents will spend less on toys and gifts this year, marketers are still planning their usual holiday ad blitz to kids.

It’s never fair for corporations to bypass parents and market directly to children.  But with parents everywhere worried about making ends meet, it’s especially cruel to bombard children with ads for expensive toys and electronics.

Your letter will go to: Mattel, V-Tech, Leap Frog, Hasbro, Spin Master, Jakks Pacific, Techno-Source, MEGA Brands, MGA Entertainment, LEGO, Activision Blizzard, Thinkway Toys, ThinkFun, Electronic Arts, Ganz, Oregon Scientific, Disney, Playmates Holdings LTD, Nintendo, Take-Two Interactive, Microsoft, KMart, Walmart, Target, and Toys R’ Us.

Dr. Diane Levin is interviewed in today’s Los Angeles Times about sexy Halloween costumes for little girls. Levin, co-author of So Sexy So Soon, brings the costume craze into the larger context of childhood sexualization and gender roles. Both boys and girls are affected.

She also makes a great point about the whole children’s costume industry:

But kids are drawn to try out new personas, and Halloween has always been about imagining yourself transformed in some edgy, scary way. Is this any different?

That’s always been one of the exciting things about Halloween. But there was once a time when children were trying out personas that were of their own making. When they decided they wanted to be a knight or something, they had to figure out what the knight did. It wasn’t a matter of having grown-ups – marketers — saying, “Here. This will make you look like such and such a character. You don’t need to do anything.” This isn’t about imagination. This is about marketers trying to hijack kids’ imaginations.

Levin also notes:

This year, the wigs and boots and makeup and all kinds of stuff to be grown up and sexy seem to have become part of every costume.

The children modeling the costumes online do seem to be wearing more makeup. And what is up with the shoes this year?

A big thank you to all the parents who attended last night’s presentation at Seward Montessori, a public magnet school here in Minneapolis. We had a terrific discussion and lots of fun as well.

I’d like to point you to a few past posts that may enhance our discussion last night:

Ad creep in the last available space, or, why do tweens need more pulp? (product placement in tween “literature”)
Pawlenty vetoes safe toy legislation but isn’t sure why
In which corporations listen to parents: Bratz doll books pulled from Scholastic’s lineup
Kids as buzz marketers

If you’re on Facebook, you can join the Parents for Ethical Marketing group. You can also follow me on Twitter.

Finally, please consider dropping a note to the FCC regarding product placement in childrens’ television programming. The current rules are being reconsidered. Deadline to reply has been extended to November 17.

You have some extra time to let the FCC know how you feel about embedded advertising in children’s television – the reply comment period has been extended until November 17.

A recent reply comment sums up the issue pretty well:

both as a parent (of a 6 year-old and a 1 week-old) and as a professional psychologist and neuroscientist, it’s obvious that commercial content is not separated from program content in the minds of young children. Please act to confirm, enforce and require the mandated separation of commercials from any programming whose audience is likely to include children under 8, as a minimum.

In other FCC news, Commissioner Adelstein has called for a ban on interactive advertising targeting children.

Image courtesy johnb2008

This is our last chance to speak up about embedded advertising is children’s television.

As part of the larger issue of new rules for embedded advertising (or product placement) in television programs, the FCC is considering what to do about children’s programming. (Background here and here.)

The FCC accepted inital public comments and is now accepting reply comments. Reply comments are due this Wednesday, October 22.

Here’s the deal: The Children’s Television Act of 1990 states that during children’s programming, there must a separation between the commercials and the program (important because, as we know, children “below the ages of 4–5 years do not consistently distinguish program from commercial content, even when program/commercial separation devices . . . are used.” And even then, “most children younger than 7–8 years of age do not recognize the persuasive intent of commercial appeals.”)

Therefore embedded advertising by its nature violates the Children’s Television Act.

So all the FCC needs to do is clarify that embedded advertising in children’s programming violates existing laws and then enforce those laws.

Ask the FCC to enforce the Children’s Television Act of 1990 by sending a Reply to Comments. Instructions are at the end of this post.

In the comments submitted by the Campaign for a Commerical-Free Childhood (full, summary), they also recommend:

that the FCC prohibit embedded advertising in primetime broadcast programming during those hours when children are likely to be in the audience.

We’re looking at you, American Idol.

I reviewed the comments — all 166 of them. More than eighty-five percent supported changes to current product placement disclosure rules (for adult programming). Most of those comments (ninety-four percent) came from individuals. Of the comments that supported leaving the rules alone, eight out of the ten came from groups, not individuals, including the American Advertising Federation, CBS, Fox Entertainment, the MPAA, NBC, Viacom, and of course, Disney.

Commenters that supported changes to the rules included the Center for Science in the Public Interest, the Children’s Media Policy Coalition, the Writer’s Guild of America-West, the Screen Actors Guild, and N.E. Marsden.

I was especially interested in the comment from Korby Siamis:

. . . I was fortunate to have a career as a writer and producer for over 25 years. I am proud of the shows I worked on, shows that left a significant imprint on American culture. I was one of the original four writers on The Cosby Show. I was a writer and producer for Murphy Brown for eight years, ultimately serving as Executive Producer. . . .

During my career, there was a clear distinction between art and advertising. On occasions that we used a product name, we would receive notices from the network Standards and Practices department. If the reference were necessary for the joke, it would stay. Otherwise we would take it out.

. . . The concept that we would ever have been expected to include product names or usage in our writing would have been beyond ludicrous, and would have been strongly fought as the worst kind of assault on our creative process. There is no quicker way to strip writers of their integrity than to make them answer to the dollar instead of their muse.

Now my television experience is that of a mother, concerned with what her children watch. I can (and do) determine which series are appropriate for my children. But the use of product placement is a more insidious force that challenges my parenting. The distinction between entertainment and endorsement is lost on my children. Short of watching every show they watch and talking to them whenever the unexpected product placement occurs, my ability to monitor this unwanted input is undercut.

How did this change take place? Why is such devolution allowed to occur? I strongly urge the FCC to use its power to reverse this trend.

Hers was one of only a handful of comments that directly addressed the issue of children’s programming. Add your voice.

It’s easy to file a comment. It doesn’t have to be formal or lengthy or especially eloquent. Go to the FCC website, type in Proceeding number 08-90, and select Reply to Comments for number 12, Document Type.

It’s Friday of fundraising week and although this drive goes until Thanksgiving, regular posting resumes on Monday. Thanks to Sara Grimes (Gamine Expedition) and Dave Orsborn (Whole Kids Project) for supporting PEM by sending their readers my way.

So, one last plea: If you value this blog and would like to see PEM’s work expand, please donate what you can. Every little bit helps.

UPDATED: Thanks also to Joe Nolan at Teen Checkup for another wonderful endorsement!

This is fundraising week here at Parents for Ethical Marketing. I’m trying to raise 10,000 dollars by Thanksgiving to continue this blog and expand PEM’s scope. It’s a modest goal, considering:

– a marketer will drop 4,000 dollars for access to data of children’s financial profiles and spending patterns; and

– marketers spend 1.4 billion dollars — per month — marketing to children.

More on why you should donate to Parents for Ethical Marketing.