Blaming junk food TV ads for obesity is wide of the mark

Enjoyable read about politics – thanks Peter

Junkfood and advertising junkfood has not risen proportionately with the girths of Australia’s youth. I’m a child of the 80’s and see little difference in the fast food market of today. What has changed is computer games and parents’ attitude to autonomous activity.

Once upon a pixel, when I would play Street Fighter or Sonic the Hedgehog, you’d get bored after half an hour or so and go outside and play. Now games are so engaging and immersive you can play them for hours on end.

Add to that parents’ safety concerns and reluctance to allow their children stray too far from the McMansion and you have an impetus for a sedentary life.

An advertiser who things we shouldn’t regulate advertising? There’s a surprise.

thinks, not things

I’m happy for people to argue against banning ads, but the hypocrisy of saying it’s because they have no impact is getting a little tired.

Oscar, you’re delusional. Games these days are actually shorter to accommodate for the falling attention spans. Long gone are the days of 100 hour long slogs of D&D, now it’s a 4 hour long Michael Bay movie for the same price.

On topic: Nobody has seen those horrific Hogs Breath ads they run during children’s programming? It’s almost hypnotic in how they try to indoctrinate your children.

And getting rid of junk food ads IS a good move. It’s OBVIOUSLY not the only thing needed to be done, and I hope that someone like Peter Miller would be smart enough to understand that it’s not the only policy in creating healthier eating. Then again, when you work for a PR agency, I suppose it’s best to please your shareholders….

I think it is an issue that is being addressed back to front. Having regulation without re-education or even perhaps some healthy options that solve the same needs – served fast, perhaps with drive through and some way to get the kids off the parents’ backs, and provided cheap.

I’ve noticed lately that the cheapest foods are actually the most unhealthy.

So, perhaps subsidising a drive through stirfry & salad facility that’s served fast and cheap could work? Not to mention a cool indoor climbing gym to keep kids happy and I think many would swap.

My observation is that it is not the food people crave, but that it is a solution.

To be honest – my kids actually whinge if I suggest we don’t have time for anything else other than McDonalds on the rare occasion that we have it. I force them to go for all the other reasons that suit me as a parent. TV is nothing to do with it in my family or any of the friends I know.

Food for thought…

Parents have no idea. Those Gen Xers who now have kids were the childen of the 80’s and early 90’s who were the first generation to grow up swamped with junk food advertising, fast food and supermarket ‘convenience’ products that distort their views of ‘real food’ values. This was the period in which fast food first truly exploded in this country. Coinciding with day care and the relegation of so many aspects of raising children to third parties (including TV’s). How would their kids now have any chance? Of course you need to regulate advertising, just for starters. Much stricter regulation around food marketing claims is also needed. Its not an issue for the advertising industry to debate and answer. Nor our parliamentarians, though they must understand the advice of genuine experts and act responsibly upon it.

Peter, some interesting suggestions. My understanding is that people like the Obesity Policy Coalition aren’t new to social media and there are loads of education awareness programs out there – the recent swap it campaign comes to mind.

The problem is bigger than using social media and education. One in four Australian kids are overweight or obese and there is a diabetes epidemic on our doorstep. Parents do say no (all the time) but junk food advertising is frequently on TV and more – social media comes to mind. Kids are frequently exposed and believe the hype. Moreover, from personal experience, I can tell you a number of parents do too.

By itself, I don’t think this move by the Greens is going to solve childhood obesity. Nor do I think promoting healthy options is going to be enough. There are far too many families out there that need help. The way food is advertised at the moment needs to be addressed, as one move in the wider way we tackle obesity in this country. Go for it Bob, I wish you luck!

Yes, this is a difficult question and yes it needs to be addressed in a number of ways, not just through the banning of television advertising. I bet they don”t argue that the ads have no effect when they sell the pitch to the client. We can all sit back and say “do nothing” or whinge about being a nanny state, but if we do that, we will all collectively pick up the health bill for those people who have not taken the time to listen to the slim spokesperson from the Obesity Policy Coalition.

No one is saying that television is solely responsible for the promotion of trans fat to littlies, but I havent heard anyone deny that it is one of the ways that kids dietary habits head in that direction.

Ban the fast food ads as a first step; pressure food manufacturers to adjust their recipes; promote healthy eating and exercise and we might all be in such good shape that the advertisers have more business than ever before (unless they are in pharma or fast food..)

Interesting theory @MR 3.14 – I assume it is opinion. I’d be interested to see if there are trends or facts to support this.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that those socialist scandinavians banned all advertising to kids under 15 a while back – and the results were real, lasting and incontestably beneficial. So they kept the ban.
As if we’d be that smart … long live the Triple Whopper!
And long live advertisers like Peter making social policy!
Oi Oi Oi!

Anne Miles – I guess its a theory based on opinion and some fact. Facts are that absolutely was the timeframe in which fast food chains truly emerged in this country and became ubiquitous and everyday, and when convenience foods in supermarkets and elsewhere exploded into prominence (microwaves only mainstreamed in the mid-80’s). Children in daycare as a % of population has more than doubled since 1984, and more than tripled for children under 2 years. So, why don’t kids play in the streets rather than sitting round watching a screen and eating shit, as so many people lament? One good reason (opinion) might be that our communities are not what they were, without one parent (mainly mums) at home to have built trust and relationships with other neighbours etc. Parents are too tired when they get home to cook proper meals, to make proper lunches for kids. The food available at primary school canteens is shocking – but principles will tell you they’d have to close them down if they didn’t make money from the crap stuff because nobody buys the good stuff. Why are primary school children even needing to buy all this crap? Who gives them money? And I’m not just talking about an icey pole. TV advertising has played a long-term role in making all this garbage legit, surely.

I’m really convinced that you’re neutral opinion is spot on.

MR, aren’t there two sides to the obesity equation? One is the energy input side (e.g. eating fast food) and clearly advertising is one of the drivers of this. Clearly, the other is the energy expenditure side.

The volume of HFHS ads on TV has been steadily declining since the mid 90s – the inverse to the rise in childhood average BMI data.

Doesn’t this tell you that the energy expenditure side of the equation is having at least (and I would argue a greater) the same effect as the advertising side? Just maybe those kids on the ‘Net and on computers and other devices (clearly the biggest worlwide social change of the past two decades) is part of the cause?

Further, do you think a campaign saying “kids – get off the computer and kick a ball around” will solve it? I don’t – though it would probably have a nudging effect. So, why do you think that HFHS advertising is many magnitudes more effective?

I’m still struggling to grasp how these little kids are getting out of school or home so regularly and paying for these Maccas meals.

FYI to everyone entering the Junk food debate. The biggest cause of junk food related obesity in Australian kids isn’t actually from food. It’s sugar in soft drinks. Like Coke, the coloured sugarwater bought to you by the company that hypocritically declared at Cannes that every Coke advertising campaign must make the world a better place.

Rushdie, I seem to recall that pure fruit juice has a comparable amount of sugar in it as well?

Upshot? Drink more water (and less of anything sweet).

I was just commenting yesterday on how good Mumbrella content had been lately, but this is freakin ridiculous! YOU SELL TV AD SPACE BASED ON DEMOGRAPHIC TARGETING! Why are you then arguing that said targeting does not work? More importantly this is a ridiculous article that fails to make one new or interesting point! “something something computer games, something internet, something blame parents etc” Be real man, TV ads make kids want to eat junk food! It’s a fact and its an industry (one that you work in!), but then it comes down to to parents to teach their kids restraint and about advertising, it’s goals and how to properly make use of the information it gives you. Did he pay to write this article?

guns don’t kill people, people kill people

Of course junk food ads work. Otherwise companies wouldn’t be doing it in the first place. This is a really simplistic viewpoint on the situation, although I would be happy to see Norm and the ‘life be in it’ crew up for a new round.

“Blaming junk food ad’s is wide off the mark” ??!

So, you are saying that advertising doesn’t work…

History repeats itself yet again!!!! I personally as a Doctor, a researcher, a parent and an Australian citizen ( not as a Greens supporter) firmly endorse the obesity coalition and Bob Browns stand on banning junk food advertising for children. Look back at history, where are our learnings here? Australia has a proud history of effective public health change. In reality these are “wicked problems” that need multifaceted solutions.
Education is one of these as is industry self regulation, both without doubt, the least effective!! Incentives and regulation including pricing are consistently proven to be most effective.
The arguments for education, choice and self regulation are the same as were mounted against antismoking initiatives. Banning junk food advertising is simply the right thing to do and the rest is self interest, lobbying and politics. In 5 years we will look back and lament the time it took us to take this first important step! There is enough learned opinion and evidence to support the banning of junk food advertising to our most vulnerable and to do it now. We now need a brave committed government .

Yep, it is ridiculous to assume that advertising may influence buyer behaviour.

If that were true then companies would spend millions on ads designed to target children to encourage them to buy junk food and on their parents to convince them that a particular brand of junk food is healthy for their kids.

Of sorry – was this actually a clumsy attack on The Greens to discredit their policy on advertising to children, based on half-truths and spin?

Can the author please declare which Junk food companies they take dollars from please, and which political party they belong to. Let’s ensure everyone is clear on the agenda here.

I’m sure people have noticed trends in the landscape of Australian advertising.

Politicians (who i’m no fan of regardless of their party) propose to limit or ban something (plain packaging, compulsory pre-commitment gambling cards).
Next thing, the industry starts a campaign saying how the rules are terrible and they won’t even work.

If they won’t work, what are the cigarette companies and clubs worries about, and if the ban junk food advertising doesn’t work – why do you companies spend millions of dollars advertising said food?

I’m not here to pick a political argument, just to highlight the hypocrisy prevelant, and the seemingly apathetic nature of Australians to such hypocrisy.

The greedy ad execs who couldn’t give a flying ferkin about society are up in arms because they earn good coin from spreading obesity in their junk food ad’s to kids.

Hey ho, society does dish out wnkers and there are plenty of them in ad world, as there are in banking: check this out if you missed it around the gfc:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/busi.....cial-value

of course junk food ads increase the uptake of junk food….that’s why they advertise. Only as ad person could argue the opposite. Give us a break.

The other reason junk food consumption increases is because it is CHEAP……what are the social stats on obesity & income?

I’m sure most of the people in this business have healthy kids because they are educated, affluent and can afford to feed their kids healthy food…it’s a social issue.

Look at the diabetes epidemic in USA to see where we are headed….and the related public health bill we’ll face as a society…..maybe KFC & co should pay ‘whole of life product’ impacts in their production costs….eg: a McMedicare levy…..

Did you know that LeBron James eats McDonalds? He exercises as well. Stop blaming / defending others because “I watched the tv commercial and it made me do it”.

Democracy = people have choice, you have the choice to eat the burger, go to the gym, etc.

If you got fat because you ate too many burgers and didn’t do the mandatory amount of exercise then you lose, isn’t it self obvious?

If people think banning fast food ads is going to mean less fast food consumption than wouldn’t that be like saying banning smoking ads equates to less smoking?

Wake up and smell the sea salt (but don’t eat it, you might get fat).

@Yawn

So you do not believe that advertising works…?

I say scrap fast food ad’s and solely promote cucumbers. For fun, lets reduce obesity in our society and create a new plague, which has something to do with the long green salad items…