I am very very afraid.

Adam J McKay

Adam J McKay

Veteran
So I am currently watching a documentary online about child marketing. Needless to say, I am a little worried. Talks about how were raping our childrens minds, mental illness and child obesity etc.

They are being developed by advertising to like only things that companies tell them to like. So I started thinking about how this relates to film and cinema. I can't help to reference idiocracy, as bad of a film as it is, it has a message. So now, as a film makers who make a living doing commercial work, you are now, depending on the type of work your doing, are mind F***ing the children of today to not want to watch your movie of tomorrow because its not a generic hollywood movie starring barbie.

The life expectancy of the children of today will be shorter than yesteryear.

http://www.wisevid.com/view_video.php?viewkey=7d18ca5ebcc8b402b63a#
 
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Whereas all this is true, how do we make a living mate?

I love independent films, heavy ones, sad ones, and non generic stuff, but also love the generic stuff...

dunno man. I hear this all the time. Several peple grew up bombarded to commericialism and turned out fine.

You're you no matter what institution you go through.

Just my thoughts, also to start a talk as this is a topic i feel strongly about.

My pet peeve is how foreign films are on a shelf on their own regardless of their genre.

I think there's more of the problem of 'you are where you are from if you're not american' than commercialism's effect on the consumer's mind.

T
 
zergtherobot said:
So I am currently watching a documentary online about child marketing. Needless to say, I am a little worried. Talks about how were raping our childrens minds, mental illness and children etc.

They are being developed by advertising to like only things that they tell them to like. So I started thinking about how this relates to film and cinema. I can't help to reference idiocracy, as bad of a film as it is, it has a message. So now, as a film makers who make a living doing commercial work, you are now, depending on the type of work your doing, are mind F***ing the children of today to not want to watch your movie of tomorrow because its not a generic hollywood movie starring barbie.

The life expectancy of the children of today will be shorter than yesteryear.

http://www.wisevid.com/view_video.php?viewkey=7d18ca5ebcc8b402b63a#
Click to expand...
If you want to really blow your mind... Watch Adam Curtis's - The century of Self. It was a four part documentary on the creation of "marketing" and "Public Relations" and their ties to the study of the human psyche....just for starters. Watch 10 mins and I guarantee you will be blown away....

http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...BaSrHsJ5z4rALCh6jIAQ&q=century+of+self+part+1

enjoy.
 
which one of us, exactly, "turned out fine"? I can't think of anyone i know that doesn't suffer some kind of maladjustment. :)

also read "Coercion" by Douglass Rushkoff.
 
Several folks man. I'm not gonna say i did.

Dare i revert to the dinner table logic of 'if everyone's screwed we're in the same boat'. Kinda like grading on a curve.

Dunno.

Lots of ppl around man. The greats of the world. Not gonna name people it's nitpicking.

Ok then we're all screwed. Short of cultivating our own food i dunno how we could overcome this.

Hence, more contructive to think and truly believe we are ok. And no one's keeping anyone in the world from thinking independently.

I've met tons of ppl here on dvxuser that I think are ok. More than that. simply cause i listen to them.

T
 
Zak Forsman said:
which one of us, exactly, "turned out fine"? I can't think of anyone i know that doesn't suffer some kind of maladjustment. :)

also read "Coercion" by Douglass Rushkoff.
Click to expand...

Well, depends on what you define as "fine". From my perspective there are lots of fine people, but of course lots of people with maladjustment as well.

On this board for example I've met plenty of fine people. And there will never be the perfect person, whatever you do.
 
We need more smoggies and the sun tots. I attribute that show to creating some of the green eco hipsters we have today. The fact is advertising works, and when marketing to such a young age, you are going to warp their psychology. I "suffer" from bad anxiety, probably caused by a lot of things. However, I decided to cut cable television from my life a couple years ago, I also started reading adbusters ( the anti consumerism magazine ) and since then my anxiety has improved 10 fold. You could argue that ignorance is bliss, but I am not bombarded on a daily basis with fear mongering media telling me I am going to die from swine flu. No wonder kids are showing signs of bi-polarity, depression and anxiety. And I highly doubt any sort of chemical imbalance being present. But as long as somebody's pocket book is getting fatter and fatter, all is well.

Really?
 
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Yeah, these things happened. I've studied it a fair bit and today's media laden world has some pretty heavy effects. Used to freak me out, too. I have some very big issues with what media tells the world, which is part of why I got involved. I generally don't work for evil corporations, though, so it might be different. Between this, the even worse education system and food there is going to be a lot of hardship in the future that we don't see coming because people are busy talking about celebrity marriages and new phones.

However, marketing has been there for a while. I had the internet from middle school on, admittedly nothing like it is today, and I ended up going totally away from that mentality. A lot of us did. It might be harder for someone who grew up in a city, but my point is that these things can be held off, and eventually can change.

Also, worth noting: the environmentalists, green movement people, whatever else all utilize marketing to indoctrinate people to their side. Even if it's the side with better end results, everyone does it. It's not going away.
 
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Must be a very well done flick to have you this way.
Of course life lines only get longer as technology develops and education grows. Once we can clone and create interchangable parts, living a few hundred years won't be a problem. Able to pass down THAT wisdom will great increase evolution. Right now, from dudes in caves beating each other with bones for the biggest chunk of meat, our evolution has only made bigger bones to beat each other with. Our biggest brain-washing system? Our military.
Hit the baby store sometime. You'll see pretty multi-colored bedroom gooes for little girls... mostyly patels and pinks. For boys, you can choose between red, white and blue and blue, red and white. At 18, the males dumbest age due to high testosterone and few experiences in life, we can sign a piece of paper that will allow us to pay the ultimate sacrifice for issues we know nothing about. (17 in some states)
We are told to just say no bt can't go to the doctor without him pushing drugs on us. We pretend to be against drunk driving in the society but happily place parking lots at bars and booze in gas stations. We know no good use for tobacco but it almost makes as much money here as salvation and sex. Heck, we even pretend to be against little things like speeding but make money off of fining for it so we do not govern it.
What am I saying? Well marketing is marketing. Good things don't need marketing because they sell themselves or are not sold at all.
Do we create fat kids? Sure. Happy healthy ones don't buy worthless products to make themselves feel better about themselves. From drugs to religeon to politics... man the last thing people really want to do is think for themselves. For a small price we'll tell ya what to think. Act now and we'll admit we are charging twice too much by giving ya two!
lol
I'm generalizing, of course. My point is enjoy the movie, man.
 
While I agree with what you are getting at zerg, the thing of it is that throughout the entire history of the human race the populace has been indoctrinated from birth onward by their culture of origin. The book The Power of Myth touches on this a bit. Basically primitive cultures had rites and rituals (not necessarily religious) that existed to transition their youth towards and into adulthood. Same thing with our current culture, although lessened when compared to say pre-European wiped out Native American Indian tribes for example.

Another interesting point Joseph Cambell makes is that you can tell which cultural entity is the primary influence, and which holds the most power over a society... look at who has the tallest buildings. In the age of kings it was castles, then the church, then national governments, and now the skyscrapers of the corporate world (which keep on getting bigger, taller, and more lavish, just look at Dubai).

I'm not saying I like it, but we do live in a corporate steered world of marketing and wacky out of control financial excess (what I like to call rampant capitalism). This financial age will someday come to an end when the next influential cultural mindset emerges. What and when that will be I don't know, but I'll take a guess that it will possibly be science or tech oriented, maybe even artificial intelligence based. Then again, we could move towards a martial society or maybe even one where artists are the primary influencers. Of course, some time in the future society could also fall apart due to a global pandemic, economic meltdown, nuclear winter from war, or a devastating natural disaster large enough to throw us into a sort of Mad Max type of post apocalyptic tribal existence, thus starting the whole damn cycle over again.

Of course you're wondering why I've diverted a bit from the topic at hand (don't worry I'm not trying to hijack the thread). What I'm getting at is that when looking at societal power structures, haven't things always been basically the same? Isn't a President similar in many ways to what a king or an emperor is? Yes there are major differences like noble birthright vs. elected office, but from a macro perspective the basic function of Obama. Bush, and Clinton are basically the same as that of Ceaser, Nero, and Aurelius. Both methods, elected official or descendent of a past ruler can yield good or bad results for the society of that time. Would Obama be able to run ancient Rome? How would Ceaser fare in Washington D.C.?

So with kings, queens, emperors, pharaohs, presidents, premiers, prime ministers, etc... we have the top of the pyramid of power. Below them are lesser politicians and noblemen (wealthy elite), high ranking military officials, celebrities (don't tell me Opra doesn't have power), and star athletes. Then of course the majority of us peasants make up the rest of the population. Same as it has been for thousands of years, same as it might be for thousands more. The wealth and power is always kept in the hands of an elite few, while some can go from rags to riches, very few of us actually do or really even have much of a chance to no matter how hard we work at it.

It makes absolutely perfect sense from a business standpoint that target marketing to children is not only a source of revenue, but a way to instill capitalist values into their young minds, thus paying off for the corporations years later. Even Hollywood seems to be really adamant about taking advantage of this element of our society by tapping the whole nostalgia factor with their favorite target demographic (the 16-25 year old male) with films like Transformers and G.I. Joe. These films should appeal to those that watched those shows after school or on Saturday mornings. They of course are no strangers to this type of marketing with all the years of fast food happy meal movie tie ins, among many other film related merchandising products.

Another thing to consider is that the financial market is a sort of living network, almost like an ecosystem. The fact is that there are organizational structures that emerge from nature and society beyond some all powerful guy or Illuminati-type group sitting in a secret board room dreaming up conspiracies to mentally program children's minds at a young age to buy buy buy. Yes, somebody thought it up, but the structure was also there waiting to emerge. I believe there is a little of both order from chaos and strategic conception that goes into these kinds of all encompassing societal programming languages.

The question that really interests me after writing all this is; how different would present day society be if corporations didn't target market towards children? Would we have our current form of rampant capitalism if this were not the case?
 
The world went to hell once everyone embraced being marketed to. There was a time when "target marketing" was a dirty phrase. Now everyone thinks they're special because Nabisco is speaking "directly to them".
 
I think there's a flipside. Because kids are marketed to at such a young age, they become immune to the messages earlier, and develop a healthy skepticism about the bullsh*t they are being fed by corporations when they become adults. This can also manifest negatively as apathy...I think the advertising industry turned a dangerous corner when they stopped selling products and started selling lifestyles -- "This brand will make you cool...This brand will make you a better person...This brand will satisfy the deepest crevice of your soul...etc" Of course, no brand can do truly do those things, so they inevitably make the person being marketed to feel empty, and of course, the only solution to that emptiness is buy another product!
 
The difference is that, in the past, there weren't as many rulers and they couldn't throw as much imagery at the people all at once. The peasants generally didn't know what was going on in the world or even who their king was; just how to grow food. That's the other extreme. Of course cultural indoctrination has always existed and in some ways is a good thing, but the situation is quite a bit different in other ways. As for indoctrinations being a good thing; we're still animals. We follow the same psychological and social rules as any other mammal, and that means many need some direction and something that makes us part of the herd, pride, tribe, whatever. I'm not going to go into a more detailed response because I'm pretty busy right now, but hopefully you can infer what I don't have time to type.
 
Batutta I agree this can be said about our generation. I personally was raised with a hippy type mother who taught me that most things I see on t.v were bullshi* and to question everything (maybe that has something to do with my anxiety haha).But even at that, I was a child who wanted and needed Nike shoes, my step father from hell even let me get a Nike symbol shaved into my head. Now I have come to realize that it's all a crock of shi*, but we are the in between generation. I know some 17 year old kids, who have kids. These 17 year old kids love bending over to the capitalist man, and so too will their children be raped. Because those kids, won't have parents telling them to question what they see on T.V but rather reinforce the false hoods that buying will make you happy, better person etc etc. And look at the music of today, rappers with gold everything, throwing money around, preaching about selling drugs and shooting people. Independent artist, which the hipster youth adore, striving to be part of an apple ad. And yes, WE understand that it's all a load of crap, but im not so sure the future generations will be able to, not if our failed capitalist system has it's dirty little way.

Question:

Would you make a pro cigarette ad directed at children? Everybody has to pay the bills right?
And I realise that it would be illegal in North America, so let's say its for a developing nation.

Edit: That question is directed everyone.

My answer is no.
My roomates answer was yes, but he would make a crap one, take the money and make an even better anti smoking ad.
 
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I'm not so sure. I think you can only be lied to for so long before you get wise. I didn't have a hippy mother telling me tv advertising was bullsh*t. I came to that conclusion on my own...Kids, especially teenagers, just want to be cool, be accepted, and brands and consumer products are an easy way to buy that coolness and get that acceptance. But we all grow up at some point...at least most of us do. Having worked on the advertising end of the business for some time this whole issue is something I have struggled with. If you go to ad conferences and hear the way these gurus talk there is a disturbing, big brother-ish way advertisers want to invade every aspect of your life. They don't talk about people any more, just eyeballs. They don't talk about the products anymore and what they do, they talk about selling an image. As Lester Bangs said, it's an "industry of cool". The product is incidental.
 
As mentioned kids can ignore spam much more than we can. While babies today have McDonalds among their first words because they recognoze the golden arches, man they don't so much as look up when a commercial break comes on. They look for the remote so they can tivo through it. They understand most dudes in neckties, from used car slaement to politicians, specialize in telling folks what they want to here, as long as it benefits them. I see it go in one ear and out the other. It's old folks who becmoe targets for bad marketing.
 
Your right, or I suppose Lester Bangs is right, or rather Cameron Crowe is right, or rather...hahaha your all right. It is an "industry of cool" but how did it get that way? Why is it that the easiest way to fit in in high school is to buy a product? Why are some teenagers ridiculed to the point of suicide. In some cases all because their family couldn't afford designer clothes and made their own instead? This is all ok? And your right a lot of people do grow up, but a lot more don't. I think it's hard to discuss on these boards because I would say at least 90 percent of the people on it understand and have "grown up"(unless your talking about camera gear haha). We understand advertising, a lot of us create the stuff. But for Joe consumer who makes damn sure his kids have nothing but the "best", usually made by children, name brands. He is doing nothing but supporting the b.s and furthermore helping to separate even further the upper and lower classes. I apologize for the class struggle tangent haha. As you might be able to tell, I am not really a fan of our current system of free market capitalism as it appears it has failed us big time. But that's another thread.

Why is it we can't advertise smoking to children but McDonalds is in the clear? I am going to go ahead and say if someone started eating McDonalds everyday at a young age, they probably wouldn't live as long as someone who was smoking. Plus if they were smoking, they would have the benefit of looking really Effing cool....And would go on to be a great musician, or writer and of course be really good looking.
 
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