Grand Theft Youth?
By Joel Gunz
Gunz Communications
Originally appeared in Vox
Reports from such observers as Ralph Nader and the Christian Coalition suggest that our nation's youths have booked passage en masse on a hell-bound hand basket -- college enrollment is down, depression is up and Levis' waistbands are all over the place. Like 1930s-era mobsters, advertisers are routinely rounded up as suspects in this blame game. A quick look at the history of this issue suggests that the truth is a bit more complicated. Depending who you ask, advertisers can even be perceived as an empowering force among youths.
Flower Power
It is commonly perceived that the 1960s were the beginning of the end of childhood, a time when youths in the counter-culture tuned out to sex, drugs and "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida." Ad agencies, so goes the official story, co-opted that trend in order to make a buck and push more Hush Puppies. As Thomas Frank asserted in The Conquest of Cool, however, youth-oriented advertising in the 1960s was less a co-optation of a newly perceived market segment (though there was plenty of that) as it was a celebration among ad agencies of the fresh perspective that youths were bringing to corporate culture. He notes that "even Leo Burnett, the Chicago-based celebrator of middle-American values, applauded in 1967 what he called the 'Critical Generation's' skepticism toward established values as potentially 'one of the healthiest things that ever happened to the human race."'
Such expressions were commonplace, and they indicated that youths were seen as both target market and source, if not of wisdom, at least, of inspiration. In other words, we can thank both the free market economy and the eternally young Pepsi Generation for the decline of the cultural rigidity represented by the Organization Man, ranch-style suburbs and the office cubicle.
Hop on Pop
More recently, it has been observed that young people -- even preteens -- are increasingly skeptical of advertising. A 2006 Harris Interactive study of youths aged eight through 18 reveals that less than one teen in 10 believes that advertisements tell the truth, while more than half say they often notice tricks companies use to get them to buy things. While it is true that advertisers are working harder than ever to appeal to the lucrative youth market, ther're doing so because youths are exceedingly shrewd consumers.
Thrift store chic has long been a part of youth culture, but in the past it was often associated with alternative or punk culture. Now, Value Village and Goodwill have entered the mainstream and kids are treating their wares as equal alternatives to pricey retailers like The Gap and Abercrombie & Fitch. Teens understand the value of a dollar, and thriftiness is "in." Says retail analyst Jennifer Black, kids shop at thrift stores "not because they don't have the money but because they want to save the money."
Further, today's youths are working smarter than many adults may even dream possible. In his recent bestselling book Everything Bad is Good for You, author Steven Johnson argues that reality TV and video games contribute to rather than detract from youths' mental development. For instance, one rainy day he introduced SimCity to his seven-year-old nephew. "I was concentrating on trying to revive one particularly run-down manufacturing district," Johnson writes, when his nephew piped up, "I think we need to lower our industrial tax rates." He concludes, "My nephew would be asleep in five seconds if you plopped him down in an urban studies classroom, but somehow an hour of playing SimCity taught him that high industrial tax rates can stifle development."
Johnson cites similar examples demonstrating that TV shows like The Simpsons and Survivor aren't necessarily the mental junk food some parents think they are. Such evidence is good news for advertisers, who use TV and games as marketing tools.
On the other hand, this news is also fodder for media critics, who decry the use of such tools as product placements and "branded content" as unfair or deceptive: it is sometimes difficult to tell if an advergame or other new media ad is really an ad.
What's more, not all is well among kids. Childhood obesity is on the rise, and the tactics of fast food purveyors are now being lambasted with a passion once aimed at Big Tobacco. As a result, regulatory bodies like the Children's Advertising Review Unit (CARU) -- part of the industry-funded National Advertising Review Committee -- have set their crosshairs on Ronald McDonald. For instance, last year CARU created a new rule requiring all mealtime foods to be shown in advertising as part of a balanced meal, displaying four out of the five food groups. Pennsylvania-based interactive firm Refinery has observed that "licensed cartoon characters, advergaming and product placement in children's programming are being scrutinized, and will likely be more restricted in the near future."
What does all of this mean? Depending on how you interpret the data, it could be either the best of times or the worst of times. One thing, however, seems certain: if a teen's job is to scare the bejeezus out of his or her parents, today's youth are performing remarkably well.
