Alcohol Advertisement Manipulates Young Minds

The number one drug problem in the United States is alcohol. The alcohol industry spends nearly $2 billion each year on advertising that specifically targets the youth of our country. These advertisements portray alcohol as fun, relaxing, and harmless. They also make the connection that alcohol is festive, related to parties, and necessary for celebrations. However, alcohol advertising is also closely linked with the media, so it is hyped up and the problems with it are dismissed. What the advertisements don’t show is that alcohol is related to the most dangerous problems in our society; murder, suicide, traffic accidents, and abuse.

Ten percent of all deaths in the United States are alcohol related. Fifty percent of all driving fatalities are related to alcohol, fifty percent of homicides are related to alcohol, and a quarter of all suicides are related to alcohol. These numbers are astonishing, and easily prevented. Putting alcohol related driving fatalities into perspective, in the United States, every thirty minutes someone is killed in an alcohol related traffic incident.

These scary facts are disregarded by alcohol companies because of the amount of money they gain back from running their advertising campaigns. The campaigns give companies brand recognition. They specific target people who are underage, so that when they are of age to drink, they have that company’s product name imbedded in the young adult’s brain. Alcohol corporations use animal mascots in their advertising campaigns.

Anheuser-Bush is a company that is famous for using animals in their marketing campaigns. One advertisement on television shows frogs burping the name, “Budweiser.” This juvenile, comedic act may correlate to the company selling almost one-fourth of all consumed alcohol in the United States. It also spends over a quarter of a billion dollars a year on advertising and promotion. An Anheuser-Busch marketing executive said, “Fifty years ago, Clydesdales were just horses. Now it is impossible for people to see them and not think of Budweiser.” This is exactly what alcohol companies aim to do.

Anheuser-Busch, like many alcohol companies have also used lizards, penguins, and dogs to represent their companies. This is specifically appealing to children, because there is a certain attraction children have to animals. Children form bonds and relationships with creatures and become attached to cartoon characters, stuffed animals, and real animals too, because it sticks with their mindset.

In a 1994 Coors advertising campaign the company hired people to dress up and as Coors beer cans and animals wearing t-shirts with the company’s logo in front of liquor stores. This definitely would catch the attention of young people, and cause them to associate the logo on the mascot’s shirt with a fuzzy animal, and cause brand recognition at a young age.

Young isn’t a relative term in this face, a 1999 study found that almost eight percent of nine-year-olds were already drinking beer. That’s a terrifying thought, second graders intentionally drinking beer. Also, a survey of eight to twelve-year-olds in Washington, D.C., found that students could name more brands of beer than they could U.S. presidents. With that survey alone, it can’t be argued that advertising doesn’t have an effect on young minds; however, evidence keeps growing connecting underage drinking with children’s exposure to alcohol advertising.

Advertisers want to hook buyers from a young age, but they also try to target binge drinkers because ten percent of all drinkers consume over 60 percent of all alcohol sold. Coincidently enough, seven million people ages 12 to 20 are binge drinkers. That means one in five people underage are binge drinkers. Each year students spend $5.5 billion on alcohol, which is more than they spend on soda, juice, coffee, tea, milk, and text combined.

Companies prey on children by using cute animals to draw them in. Then, when children begin to drink (could be as early as second grade) they know what brand to get because they remember the logo from the animal advertisement. 500,000 young people, ages 9-12 (third graders to sixth graders) are dependent on alcohol in the United States. This same demographic sees more than 1,000 commercials for beer and wine coolers every year. They also watch movies where 92 percent have alcohol in them, including 52 percent of G-rated films. So, by this time the children, along with young adults are binge drinkers who consume most of the alcohol sold in the United States.

Kilbourne, Jean. Deadly Persuasion Why Women And Girls Must Fight The Addictive Power Of Advertising. New York: Free, 1999. Print.

By Heather Barrett

Fear in the Media

Our society as a whole is extremely dependant on the media. Individuals rely heavily on what we know to be true so as to make decisions for daily life. The younger generations are extremely susceptible to be by the media. Advertisements use fear to persuade their audience.

The news and the media appear to be centered on fear. It is not usually obvious, but practically everything related to the media, including politics, economics, and social aspects, relates to fear, no matter how miniscule or significant it may be towards public perception of life.

Fear is a motivator towards portraying oneself or doing things a certain way. The media has the ability to say anything to relate to individuals and persuade them to believe the most exaggerated and stretches of the truth. This can be carried over to the simplest things such as an exaggeration of the severe weather in a specific area, to worldwide issues such as the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

With the constant war overseas, there exists an endless amount of fear towards terrorism. The media portray the war as realistically as possible so that we can understand what’s going on. It shows how our troops are doing as they struggle to work and survive fighting. This subconscious and literal fear for personal lives and the country as a whole causes the constant feeling of necessary protection and pressure to support of the government so we can continue to live safely.

A personal form of protection is the use of condoms and birth control, which the media has successfully advertised as beneficial. The younger generations in particular, learn to protect themselves with advertised products because of their fear of sexual consequences; such as pregnancy or receiving an STD.

With our nation’s current economic state, there is fear of the economy crashing. This causes many people to consume more carefully. The majority of the public benefits from learning about how the nation is operating and struggling. In general, the media forces individual people to learn from others’ mistakes so that they can live comfortably and struggle less in the future.

Advertisements for products often make people fearful of being something less than society’s ideal form of being an airbrushed beauty. It also pushes people to fear being ridiculed by their peers for not having the latest toys, clothing, and accessories. Therefore, they may go out and purchase products to feel more socially accepted by society and peers. The media portrays characters in advertisements a certain way. The public often fears rejection so they adjust their lives to fit in with the present social norms. Advertisements primarily target students and young adults because they are most aware of society’s perception of them.

In addition, fear of illness is always relevant, especially for young people who are more susceptible to health risks because they are in school. The media displays the rare and worst cases of health risks and epidemics, which causes panic in people. The more realist cases of illness, which are less worrisome to the public are absent from the media. Most recently, the nationwide fear of getting Swine Flu, causes the public to consume more products for heath protection and also be more hygienic.

This also carries into the media and the government supporting many vaccines and medicines for illnesses, which may not be necessary. Many people are strongly against receiving unnecessary vaccines that could be more harmful than beneficial, especially if they are recently produced, such as the swine flu vaccine. The media practically forces the public to feel as though they should receive such vaccines, while many people fear the vaccines for their own health and personal beliefs. However, with pressure from all directions of the public, primarily students and education institutions who want to prevent illness, even in the rarest form, they try to persuade in favor of what they want, using facts and information through the media.

It’s understandable that the news displays the most significant and interesting stories, which happen to be primarily about things going wrong or not exactly as planned, but that is just the type of world we live in. Privacy is a concept which is understood and desired by everyone, which causes people to want it even more when they do not receive it, such as being in the news for something they are less than fond of.

Our society functions by learning and knowing what is going on in order to consider options and make decisions based on what is personally believed to be the truth. With the media surrounding the public and constantly telling the possible truths, it’s undeniable that the choices made by the young public will definitely be influenced to some extent.

By Amanda Clinton

Tobacco Surrounds Society

The media has been used to advertise and publicize countless products as their popularity has fluctuated over the decades, tobacco in particular. Tobacco is one of the few products that is widely known as being hazardous to one’s health, yet so many people continue to smoke cigarettes and use other tobacco products.

One would think that since it is publicly known how harmful cigarettes are, that people would wish to stop smoking, and prevent others from doing so as well, but that is not exactly the case. Smoking is all around us; it’s inescapable, in the media, culture, and so much of our daily life. It is a habit that many people pick up and enjoy for their personal reasons, although knowingly putting their health at risk. Our generation of young adult smokers has been increasing and makes up approximately fifteen percent of cigarette smokers in the U.S., which is quite surprising considering older smokers have decreased to about seven percent nationwide.

The average age of first time tobacco use is eighteen years old, primarily because that is the age when the generation initially goes off to college, can legally buy tobacco in most states, and is most susceptible to products that they want to try and experiment with. There are many restrictions on the media as far as how to advertise tobacco products. Young adults see that smoking is everywhere; especially with countless students having an interest in such products, since young people often do not seem to care about the detrimental health effects.

Public advertisements for tobacco monopolized the radio and television until January 2, 1971, when the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act was passed by Congress and publically went into effect. The legal ban against smokeless tobacco advertisements did not go into effect until August 28, 1986. After the 1971 smoking act was passed, advertisements for tobacco were primarily produced in print, such as in newspapers, magazines, and billboards.

Even though it is technically regulated and illegal for companies to publicize tobacco on the television, countless TV shows do not restrict characters from smoking cigarettes. Smoking is a major way to characterize people and give them personal traits and habits, whether or not they are healthy qualities. The media exposes children of all ages to a certain viewpoint of tobacco. In order to make a significant profit, companies will blatantly publicize tobacco as though it is a positive substance. When surrounded by it for so long, children will grow up having this mindset and possibly feel it customary to join the supposed norm of smoking in order to fit in since that may be what they have become accustomed to.

Before tobacco advertisements were prohibited on TV and radio, the commercials would primarily advertise cigarettes, which are a harmful product, as being a positive item for consumption. Advertisements in the media always seem to find loopholes around the truth to make them more appealing to the general public, who may not be very knowledgeable about the products. This is why it is extremely beneficial that within recent years, a number of the “truth” TV ads, directed primarily at the younger generation, have made a major effort to spread awareness in the media about how harmful tobacco is as a substance. Proving that, aside from trying to advertise to gain a financial profit, the media can be used as both a positive and negative force towards the younger generations in particular.

Tobacco companies advertise and inform the public in different ways in order to properly attract the smokers for their specific tobacco products. The companies are required to visibly print a warning somewhere on the package, although they may do this by displaying a simple note or phrase referencing a general health risk in small print on the side or bottom of the cigarette box. Even with a noted warning on the package, companies may not seem to have a bias for whoever purchases their tobacco products as long as they continue to have efficient sales, but different cigarette types and assortments have been advertised towards specific demographics.

Each brand and type of cigarette is slightly different because it is specially classified and directed at a certain type of person, although this may not be obvious to the general public. Specifically, the 1920’s began the era when cigarettes primarily for women were heavily publicized, such as Virginia Slims. Slims and light brands of cigarettes would often appeal towards women in light of being classy, sophisticated, and keeping their physical appearance as they prefer. In addition, some brands even advertise using a media icon, like how Marlboro has the Marlboro Man. He is an average guy who smokes cigarettes, but not just any cigarettes, Marlboros, since they’re displayed as being perfect for the typical American guy.

As young children grow up with advertisements and people smoking ads and billboards surrounding them, one in five young adults will pick up the habit and struggle to quit, if and when they choose to. The generation of young smokers continues to increase, but the government and nation as a whole is making a significant effort to prevent the media from further publicizing and supporting this addictive habit. As a struggling smoker, President Obama wants to help prevent the younger generations from being blatantly exposed to smoking.

Obama publicly began the fight to prevent the young generations from smoking so excessively by signing a bill in June of 2009. The bill is referred to as the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act. It gives the U.S. Food and Drug Administration significant powers to regulate tobacco and the media’s use of tobacco towards the younger generations. Under this new law, the FDA will be able to prohibit cigarette advertising, specifically those that target children, and ban flavored cigarettes and labels such as “low tar” and “light” cigarettes. This will limit the exposure of tobacco advertisements surrounding young children, in hopes of preventing the young generation of children from growing up with an interest and acceptance to smoking cigarettes.

By Amanda Clinton

PostSecretd

PostSecret is a community based art project created by Frank Warren. The project started as a dream while he was on a trip to Paris in 2003. In his dream he saw three post cards that he had bought while on the trip, he dreamt that the messages on each of the postcards had been altered. Warren stated, “the first message read, ‘unrecognized evidence, from forgotten journeys, unknowingly rediscovered,’ the second message was about a ‘reluctant oracle’ postcards art project and the last message I could not understand at the time.” When Warren awoke he decided to recreate the postcards as he had seen them in his dream. Little did he know that his dream would lead to the phenomenon of PostSecret.

The following year Warren followed his dream, literally, and started the “reluctant oracle” project. He put printed out pictures and wrote messages on them along with stamps into clear, glass wine bottles. He dropped these bottles into the Clopper Lake in Gaithersburg, Maryland. At this time he was an anonymous artist, but his mysterious bottles gained recognition all over the world. People were puzzled, yet fascinated by the floating bottles. His last bottled message from this collection said, “you will find your answers in the secrets of strangers.” Warren distributed 3,000 blank postcards and wrote down two things on the back. The first was his home address, and the second was an invitation to anonymously share a secret. He left some of the blank postcards in the lake, but handed out most of them. He passed them out on the street, left some in library books, and “forget” a number of them on restaurant tables.

With the first 100 postcards he received, he decided to created an art exhibit in Washington, D.C. Warren fully expected that the project would be finished the day that his exhibit ended because he had stopped handing out blank postcards; however, that was not the case. He continued to receive creatively decorated postcards on a daily basis, and found that people were mailing them from all over the world. Warren wanted to continue sharing these secrets with the world, so he created a website, and every Sunday he shares about 20 secrets with the world.

Sharing a secret is therapeutic; the artist feels relief because their secret is finally out in the open. On the other side, some followers of PostSecret have never mailed a postcard in, they simply find that it’s the pure beauty of other people’s courage that is so moving. A student follower of PostSecret shared, “I have never shared a secret, I don’t feel as if I have to because it is so universal, each person’s secret somehow relates to some person out there, whether they wrote it or not.”

PostSecret is completely anonymous, but it brings an entire community and generation together. It gives the viewers reassurance that they are not alone. A Champlain student commented, “Everyone has a secret, and when you go to PostSecret it is a reminder of just how similar we all are. We all have similar wants, needs, and feelings. We all get sad, lonely, and depressed. We all experience love, heartbreak, disappointment, and joy.” PostSecret is an inspirational medium and is extremely unique.

In modern society, the media controls many aspects of our lives. It forces people to feel badly about themselves. The media sets trends, such as appearance and it also magnifies societies pressures. The pressure to go to college, get married, have children, and to overall be successful in fulfilling the American dream that society created. PostSecret is a gateway for people to honestly express how they feel. It is a non-judgmental medium that people can turn to when there is no one to talk to. Another Champlain student stated, “I think PostSecret showcases that the media can be used to do something very positive for our generation. It is one of the only outlets in the media that truly displays people as true figures, and not the cookie cutouts that society wants us to be.” The media has taught our generation to be strong, and that it is unacceptable to show weaknesses. PostSecret is a platform for being able to finally show raw, inner emotions, that most people are forced to bottle up.

An equally admirable quality to PostSecret is that Warren has gained an enormous amount of empathy for humans, and specifically our generation. At many of his college tours he uses the event to promote campus health services and the general well being of his viewers. Warren views postcards that come from depressed artists. His PostSecret community is one vehicle to express emotions, but he has also joined forces with the National Hopeline Network (1.800.SUICIDE) to further help his followers. He widely promotes his wellness resources, because of his gained empathy by creating this art project. Warren pairs up with many wellness resources, but is the largest advertisement free blog in the entire world.

Warren’s newest book, PostSecret: Confessions on Life, Death, and God is now being sold.

Warren, Frank. "Sunday Secrets." Web log post. PostSecret. Web. 9 Dec. 2009. .

PostSecret Community. Web. 10 Dec. 2009.

By Heather Barrett

Twenty-Nine Techiniques to Buy You!

Daily we are bombarded by the persuasive messages that the media sends us until we are on board with their ideas, products, and messages. In a sophisticated world were the techniques of persuasion keeps growing more and more complex, it’s important as members of society to have at least some understanding of how our media makes turns us into consumers.

There are up to 29 techniques used in advertising, speeches, broadcasting etc. that persuade us to agree with what we are being exposed to. These range from The Big Lie persuading through dishonesty, Simple Solutions persuading by offering one quick solution to life’s problem, to techniques like Fear persuading by appealing to an enemy, Beautiful People persuading by having good looking individuals marketing a product, to Maybe, which is persuading by using assuring words. Any of these sound familiar? There is a wide range of techniques that we all are faced with everyday without even knowing.

Some of the most common techniques used are Hyperbole, Bandwagon, Simple Solutions, Fear, Beautiful People, Warm Fuzzes, and Plain Folk. Each of these persuasive techniques are prime examples of our media manipulating us into order.

Hyperbole is to make an exaggerated claim, when we see a product that is followed by a tag line reading “The best smoke ever!” we’re going to have assumptions, we’re going to think, ‘what does the best smoke ever feel like?’ It’s a trick that is played in our mind until we spend the five dollars to try the product and know for ourselves.

Bandwagon, saying that everyone is doing it can be beneficial for both advertisers and politicians. It allows the politician to make you feel secure in your choices, and putting your faith and reliance in their hands. To consumers, it gives off the feeling that if you don’t have this product, you are going to be the only one without it, therefore dubbing you as an outcast.

Simple Solutions will offer you that quick fix to that on going problem, a perfect example are weight loss products that claim they will take away all that extra weight without you having to exercise and eat correctly. Not to mention the restoring of your probably suffering self esteem.

Fear is a technique that is controlling our news. To persuade by appealing to an enemy, such as a communist or terrorist, is something that our news media exposes us to daily. It is always bad news; it’s always something negative that is the top story and rarely an achievement of any kind, but we as society would rather hear the bad then the good.

Beautiful people is a technique used that persuades us because we see advertisements that are endorsed by good-looking individuals. It leads us to believe that since they use this product, we will look like them if we use it too. This is mainly used for the advertisement of make-up, which can also fit into the Simple Solution technique.

Warm Fuzzes is typically used in advertisements that are directed towards children or families. These ads typically feature children or animals that are larger and fuzzy, or talking. An example would be dog food commercials or even a family oriented mascot for a company, like “Little Debbie”.

Finally, Plain Folk, and this technique is one that can be featured in most media outlets. This technique uses people that they feel are relatable to the typical average American. They feature people in everyday jobs with a problem they encounter, and then comes the product to save the day. One example is advertisements for things such as Aspirin or Tylenol. A mother can mention that lifting her child or doing housework causes her back pain, take an Aspirin! A construction worker says that the noise of the site causes a sever headache, take Tylenol!

All these different techniques are just some of the ways that we are manipulated into being a consumer of certain products, or believing certain news briefs. “It effects me much more then I realize,” says Meagan King, a sophomore at Clark University. “I believe it much more then I’d like to admit. If I see a commercial and can relate to someone, I’ll believe what the advertisement is telling me.” This is true of many people in today’s society. Meagan is just one of many that believe what they hear, and why shouldn’t she? We should feel that we can trust in the media to want to benefit society over their wallets. Unfortunately, this statement falls far from true most of the time.

“I’ll try many products until I find one,” King begins. “But I’m a busy person; I just grab what I know. If your advertising campaign is better then the competitors, I’ll purchase your product because it’s in my head.” With such hectic lifestyles, we all put some reliance on the media to make things easier for us, and to directly give us what we need.

“It’s the same with the news really.” King says. “I usually just hear bits and pieces of stories, and that’s what I have to go from. If the media wanted me to believe a pig flew and CNN did a story, I’d probably believe it.” There you have it media sources – you’ve officially got us.

By Caitlin Golub

Stereotypes in the Media

We are all stereotypes. They act as a code in society to quickly categorize what kind of person someone is. There are the typical high school stereotypes we all heard, and thanks to movies like “The Breakfast Club” we will remember forever. Stereotypes are a play on personality, they are categories that society places us in, but the real issue is the stereotyping that we not fully aware of, and that’s gender stereotyping.

Sure, we know it for women. That’s an obvious one with all the attention it has gathered in the past decades. Fighting for equality, rights, and acceptance and not only making leeway, but also making a severe impact in the world. Women have fought to be given equal job opportunities, have an equal say in society and our nation by voting, and have worked to rid themselves of the ever lasting image as a housewife. In addition to this, the viewing of woman as a sex symbol has greatly impacted the way today’s youth views how a woman she look.

Without a doubt, media stereotyping is inevitable, especially in advertising, news, and the entertainment industry. It’s said that in “advertising industries, media stereotyping is standard protocol for boosting the success of programming and accessibility towards viewers” (Harper). It is a disappointment that our society has come down to this, that in order to make something sell men and women need to show some skin or use sex appeal to appeal to consumers.

Women today are made to believe that unless they are a size zero, they are overweight. This is not sending the right message to today’s youth. Even through television shows the female characters are portrayed as stick figures, with long flowing hair. Girls today are more pressured than ever to look a certain way. This image is what they are led to believe is beautiful, and unless they match that description they are led by today’s media to believe that they are not socially acceptable. This is just a large means of propaganda.

Besides needing to have the perfect body, the media depicts women as helpless, idiotic, and dependent on males. This places a stereotype on the male gender as well. Women view men to be not only the usual tall dark and handsome, but in addition we view them as needing to be muscular, a savior, and an overall prince charming. They need to come to every defense for a woman, be a shoulder to cry on, and more importantly when we are in trouble, we expect them to slay the dragon and carry us to safety.

This may not be seen as a big issue for men, thinking that something as positive as this is a good stereotype to have. But more women than you realize fall into believing this stereotype of men, truly thinking that this is what’s normal, and this is what they need to hold out for in a man. More importantly, this is sending the message that women need to rely on men, and women are incomplete without them.

Shows like “The Simpsons” and “Family Guy” are jammed packed with stereotypes within a 30 minute time period, and the stereotypes they portray what is perceived as normal, acceptable, and comes off as humorous to society. We do nothing to monitor this type of reaction because we are so accustomed to it. However, it is well acknowledge that this stereotyping is unacceptable and something needs to change- but who is actually taking the steps to make that change?

Day in and day out we are submerged in media that is capable of morphing everything and making it something that we deem as normal. It’s something we fall prey to daily, something that has an effect on us all, and something we don’t realize is happening. We play into the stereotypes because we don’t know any better, and we look to people as being in that stereotype because we use them to put people into categories. It’s propaganda at its finest, but it is a selling technique. It’s something that someone can always relate and identify with, because we all stereotype, and we all reinforce them.

By Caitlin Golub