Kids taught to want more stuff

What do SpongeBob, Dora the Explorer and Ariel the mermaid have in common?

You may think it's their quick wit, their irresistible appeal and their wholesome influence on your preschooler. But Susan Linn says they're really hucksters designed to sell your kids a bill of goods.

"When the religious right attacked SpongeBob for being gay, I thought, 'That's the wrong battle,' " said Linn, a Harvard psychologist who was born and raised in Detroit. "The point is that he's a tool for selling stuff -- clothes, movies and junk food."

Linn was the keynote speaker Saturday at Metro Parent Magazine's forum in Livonia that addressed the deep and often-subtle influence that commercialism has on children. For Linn, author of "Consuming Kids: The Hostile Takeover of Childhood," it's important that parents understand that while media aimed at kids may be cute or even educational, the purpose is often to directly pitch products to kids.

Buy, baby, buy

Selling products to kids is not new. But, according to Linn, children were discovered as a marketing group in the 1970s. A decade later, Congress took away the Federal Trade Commission's ability to regulate marketing to children, and it deregulated children's television. Those factors, coupled with the diversification of media -- from television to videos, cell phones, computers and cable television -- makes it hard to insulate children from commercialism.

What's worse, marketers are now using science to capture the loyalty of babies, hoping to parlay brand identification into a lifelong loyalty that James McNeal, author of "Kids as Customers: A Handbook of Marketing to Children," says is worth at least $100,000 per consumer.

"You have a $15-billion marketing industry working with the most sophisticated research," Linn said in an interview last week. "They actually use words like 'cradle-to-grave brand loyalty' or 'owning kids' or 'taking share of mind.' For parents, it's like fighting a smart bomb with a BB gun."

Stay-at-home mom Jodi Friedman, 34, said commercialism is tough to stave off.

The West Bloomfield mother said that her 3-year-old twins, Ellie and Jenna, already seem to understand that if they see something on television, there will be a toy tied to it in the store. Friedman tries to temper the commercialism with lessons in moderation.

"We don't buy something every time we go to the store," she said. "Now that the holidays are coming, they know they will make a list, then pick out a few things that are the most important to them."

Right now, her girls are "princess crazy" -- an obsession that was fueled by a trip to the Disney store. But Friedman said she feels that buying her girls princess paraphernalia is less about giving in to marketing than about supporting imaginative play. Television can be a valuable educational tool if used properly, she said.

"For example, they wanted the Dora dollhouse after watching the Dora TV show," Friedman said. "But they also got introduced to Spanish from Dora. Parents have to take responsibility when raising their children. I think about what programs will make them smarter."

Values for sale

But Linn said that the stakes are higher than passing princess fancies or learning a new language from a television show. Society's values are being jeopardized, she said. A study by the Center for a New American Dream, a coalition to help Americans consume responsibly, reports that 88% of Americans feel society is too materialistic.

But it's not only materialism creeping into our homes. It's sexual precociousness and violence, too.

"The Bratz dolls are extremely sexualized, and they're being targeted to young girls," Linn said. She added that "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City" was a top-selling video game for preteens in 2004.

"That's the one that depicts sex with a prostitute and murder. Kids who have received the direct marketing will ask for these things, and the parents or grandparents have no idea what they're buying."

The solution, Linn said, is for parents to educate one another and protest direct marketing to children.

"Years ago, Tipper Gore got a lot of flack from teens when she suggested that there be ratings for music CDs," Linn said. "Now those teens are parents and they're thinking, 'Tipper was right.' "

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