Parents Influence

A lot of this really comes back to parents, not just the companies. Yeah, businesses use tricks to get kids to want stuff, like bright colors, cartoon mascots, and toys inside meals, and that part isn't exactly fair. But at the end of the day, parents are still the ones who decide what actually gets bought, how much screen time their kids get, and what shows or apps they're even allowed to be on in the first place. A commercial can make a kid want something, but it can't put it in the cart or hand over a credit card. So it's probably not fair to put 100% of the blame on companies when families play just as big of a role in what their kids end up seeing and getting. If a kid is watching hours of ads every day, that's partly on the parents too, because they control a lot of that environment at home. That doesn't mean companies get to do whatever they want, but it does mean the responsibility goes both ways. The most realistic view is that this is a shared responsibility instead of one side being the villain. Companies should have to advertise fairly and honestly, without straight up tricking little kids or pushing junk food nonstop, but parents also have to do their part by setting limits, talking to their kids about ads, and just saying no when they need to. When both sides actually do their job, kids are way more protected than they would be if we only blamed one side and ignored the other.

Written by: Ritu S.