Media for Children with Adult Content

I absolutely agree with Shannon’s blog. Times seem to be changing faster than ever. I mean we are not that old, nineteen and twenty. Yet it seems like we grew up in an entirely different era.

Today kids know more than ever before about life, sex, and society. However, what they may know as “normal,” “average,” and “common” really isn’t real, until media influences it to be. It’s real to them because the media says it is.

Two things that have recently come out and I’ve seen on TV really disturb me. First, are the new Disney cell phones. You see in commercials kids that clearly aren’t even in middle school yet with cell phones. That’s not real, or at least it wasn’t ten years ago, even five years ago. I didn’t get a cell phone until I was sixteen in 2002. My sister didn’t get a cell phone until she was fourteen in 2003. That was “normal,” but as the media increasingly showed that “normal” is nine and ten year olds having cell phones, media normal became real life normal. Now, especially in affluent areas like Ashburn children in elementary school have cell phones, not because they need them, but because they wanted them and through tantrums and badgering they got them.

The second thing that really disturbs me is Baby Bratz, a new TV show for kids. In the show cartoon toddlers are drawn to look like the popular Bratz dolls (which is a whole other topic – they almost put out a line of Pussy Cat Dolls). These “babies” have long styled hair, platform shoes, mini skirts, halter tops that show their mid-drift, and make-up. The thing that really got me was at one point one of the girls is caught stealing coins from the fountain at a mall (great behavior modeling, NOT!), a security guard catches her, but she is let go after she bats her long curled eyelashes at him. I find that to be so disgusting, it teaches girls they can do bad things as long as they know how to be sex enough to an adult (male) to get a way with it. Not only is this wrong, but it’s dangerous too.

Today instead of watching Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers, or Winnie the Pooh and actually learning useful and wholesome life lessons, as our generation did in the late 80’s and early 90’s, children are watching shows like Baby Bratz which is teaching toddlers that sexy is good. Why has everything changed so fast? Well according to a documentary I watched a few months ago and the makers of Merchants of Cool would probably agree, media and advertisement executives realized the full potential of a child’s and teen’s buying power in the mid 90’s. This is when Power Rangers, Pokemon, Power Puff Girls, and Sponge Bob emerged shortly followed by their full line of dolls, clothing, backpacks, and lunch boxes. Kids want to be cool, so if that means a girl has to have a mini skirt at age three just like a Power Puff Girl or Bratz, and a boy need to have weapons like Power Rangers to fight and "kill" enemies then so be it.