advertisment aimed at children should be banned

Thank you. As can be seen, my opponent has presented no opening arguments to support his stance, but I will not hesitate to present my own arguments in favor of a ban on "advertisement aimed at children," which, I presume, means any form of advertisement on television, web, magazines, etc. that is aimed at children. Advertisement: "A notice, such as a poster or a paid announcement in the print, broadcast, or electronic media, designed to attract public attention or patronage."[1] Ban: "To prohibit, especially by official decree."[2] I have no need of defining the term "children" (plural). I sincerely hope that everybody here knows what that means. -- Arguments -- I shall begin by asking: what exactly is advertisement for children? Who determines that? Where do we place a border between advertisement for children and advertisement for adults? What kind of content differentiates between content for children and content for adults? Surely, most people may say that toys are for children and action movies are for adults, but there are other things that are rather very difficult to categorize and aim at a particular group of people. Before the 90's, the content on television was clearly not mixed, i.e. content for the young viewers was differentiated to content for the more aged viewers. As can be seen on a list of cartoons from the 80's,[3] there were very few that showed any sort of adult content, such as display of human bodies without enough clothes. As a matter of fact, I clicked on random cartoons and found only one to show depiction of half-naked bodies. The greatest fraction is indeed not filled with such content. For instance, the cartoon "Babar"[4] is clearly for children. It is based on a book for children and shows no adult content. However, even during the 90's, most content for children was not to be mistaken with content for adults. Child singers were no bad role models for other youngsters. A good example is a singer called Kimberly Scott. As far as I am aware, she sung during the late 90's, and was a child singer. One of her well-known songs is called "Tuck Me In" and the lyrics are indeed splendiferous.[5] Such songs and singers were not influencing children in any antagonistic way. However, as downtrodden as it is, it is undeniable that with the songs from teenage/child singers nowadays, youngsters are influenced in a very negative way. A good example is the singer called Miley Cyrus. She is young, hardly an adult at this point as far as I am concerned, and not only are her songs influencing children in a negative way, but so does her appearance and perhaps also lifestyle. You may ask, "Dear Mirza, why are you telling us all this?" A simple question with a little more complicated answer to it, I must say. I will throughout this round explicate this. o Advertisement Nowadays, it is very hard to isolate specific content for a particular group of people. In the 90's, it was enough for a parent to turn off the television and prevent his child from watching movies or seeing all different sorts of advertisements. Withal, that is not the case today. We have the Internet, television, and gaming consoles (which can be used for web browsing). Most children in developed countries have a strong desire for video gaming consoles, the Internet, and such similar media and technology. It is indeed so that a child avoiding any of those is difficult. They can either learn how to break parental control, visit a friend to browse the web, and so forth. Therefore, they have constant access to almost anything related to the media. Therefore, the dangers of advertisements are even greater today than ever before, and we should take the steps necessary to eliminated negative advertisements from television. How about the Internet? Yes, we can indeed set a ban that applies for advertisements on the web, even though it is not easy to trace the criminals. o Negative effects of advertisement aimed at children This is the main part, namely about the negative effects of advertisement aimed at children. As I explained above, advertisement today, even for children, is of mixed kind. A singer like Miley Cyrus differs a little to one like Rihanna, both in terms of songs and appearance. Therefore, any advertisement of Miley Cyrus, i.e. her songs and appearance, is not different to advertisement of Rihanna, who is an adult, yet it is clear that the advertisements of Miley Cyrus are far more dominant on television channels for children. This is clear evidence that adult content is mistaken with child content. 1. Teen stars advertised As I have made evident already, teen stars are advertised and the advertisements are aimed at children. However, lots of songs of the albums that are being advertised are indeed not appropriate for children. A song called "Can't Be Tamed" by Miley Cyrus begins with the following words: "For those who don't know me, I can get a bit crazy Have to get my way, 24 hours a day 'Cause I'm hot like that Every guy everywhere just gives me mad attention Like I'm under inspection, I always get the 10s 'Cause I'm built like that" She speaks of being "hot" and every guy giving her "mad attention." Then she makes an ultimate personal conclusion and ends the first part with, "'Cause I'm built like that" - Indeed this is making her a very bad role model, yet she appears on television throughout the world, especially on channels for children. This can make non-adolescent girls have very low self-esteems because they think that they are not beautiful at all, seeing how they do not get any similar attention like Miley Cyrus does, even though they do whatever they can, and start displaying their bodies. This can eventually lead to suicide. 2. Unhealthy food advertised Obesity is a plague in the United States of America.[6] People, especially youngsters, are exposed to flows of unhealthy food advertisements. While children grow up, especially before they reach puberty, they develop strong desires for what their environment seems to be in favor of, looking from their perspective. With many people enjoying fast food, television advertising it daily, it is clear that the effect is gross.[7] Therefore, this form of advertisement should be banned for children. 3. Children ask too much of parents Putting aside the negative influences and effects I mentioned above, when children are exposed to advertisements of toys, they wish to ask their parents to buy them, and unfortunately, not all parents can buy many toys for their children to play with. This may make a child feel distanced to his parents because it may not understand why his parents do not want to meet his needs for materials. See source #8 please. Until we reach a point - which seems to be unlikely, unfortunately - where we are able to determine what kind of advertisement is particularly good for children, we should avoid advertising to them. -- References -- [1] http://www.thefreedictionary.com... [2] http://www.thefreedictionary.com... [3] http://www.80scartoons.net... [4] http://www.80scartoons.net... [5] http://www.fresh-lyrics.com... [6] http://www.annecollins.com... [7] http://www.msnbc.msn.com... [8] http://www.youngmedia.org.au...