2008 Woodie Awards
The Real Deal: Conformity can be so intoxicating
Paul McNeill
Issue date: 9/18/07 Section: Opinions
Lawmakers are hoping to teach school children that sometimes you gotta show a little temperance.
Mary Easley, wife of North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley, and acting U.S. Surgeon General Kenneth Moritsugu announced last week a program that will target children as young as 10 with an aggressive anti-drinking campaign that instructs North Carolina students to understand how advertising drives their decision-making and how commercials can manipulate their choices. North Carolina education officials will implement the program in all middle schools by January.
Teen drinking is widespread-scientific studies aren't needed to point that out-with an estimated 11 million underage drinkers nationwide. Thirty-five percent of North Carolina middle school students report having had a drink of alcohol, and 21 percent of high school students said that they had their first drink before 13 years of age.
The campaign is a good start with noble intentions, but one point seems to have eluded policymakers throughout the years. While children no doubt are impressionable and easily persuaded by media, the main reason children smoke, drink, or abuse drugs isn't because a cartoon camel or a humorous commercial tells them to; it's because adults tell them not to. Taboo is the strongest of instigators.
It's possible such strong anti-drinking programs could have very pro-drinking side effects, similar to some abstinence campaigns that have led to higher rates of teen sex. Such campaigns are sure to have immediate effects on pre-adolescents, but it's questionable whether the results' staying power is any match for peer pressure and the demands of a high school social life. Perhaps the key trigger of reckless behavior is the need to fit in. Individualism isn't a virtue to many adolescents. Often the biggest pusher isn't Budweiser and Marlboro. It's a teenager's peers.
"We can control and enhance our children's ability to deconstruct and critically think about the messages they receive in commercial advertising," Mary Easley said Sept. 12 during the program's introduction.
Mary Easley, wife of North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley, and acting U.S. Surgeon General Kenneth Moritsugu announced last week a program that will target children as young as 10 with an aggressive anti-drinking campaign that instructs North Carolina students to understand how advertising drives their decision-making and how commercials can manipulate their choices. North Carolina education officials will implement the program in all middle schools by January.
Teen drinking is widespread-scientific studies aren't needed to point that out-with an estimated 11 million underage drinkers nationwide. Thirty-five percent of North Carolina middle school students report having had a drink of alcohol, and 21 percent of high school students said that they had their first drink before 13 years of age.
The campaign is a good start with noble intentions, but one point seems to have eluded policymakers throughout the years. While children no doubt are impressionable and easily persuaded by media, the main reason children smoke, drink, or abuse drugs isn't because a cartoon camel or a humorous commercial tells them to; it's because adults tell them not to. Taboo is the strongest of instigators.
It's possible such strong anti-drinking programs could have very pro-drinking side effects, similar to some abstinence campaigns that have led to higher rates of teen sex. Such campaigns are sure to have immediate effects on pre-adolescents, but it's questionable whether the results' staying power is any match for peer pressure and the demands of a high school social life. Perhaps the key trigger of reckless behavior is the need to fit in. Individualism isn't a virtue to many adolescents. Often the biggest pusher isn't Budweiser and Marlboro. It's a teenager's peers.
"We can control and enhance our children's ability to deconstruct and critically think about the messages they receive in commercial advertising," Mary Easley said Sept. 12 during the program's introduction.
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