Evolving for the Worst

Anybody could tell you that America is the fattest country in the world, and it’s only getting fatter. Fast food advertising is on every street corner, on almost every billboard, on every channel, it is all round us and we can’t avoid it. Due to the lack of parental guidance and restrictions on fast food marketing, major corporations like McDonald's have successfully embedded such an unhealthy lifestyle on young kids. These younger generations are progressively developing a more and more unhealthy diet and lifestyles that are only getting worse. Using rhetorical marketing strategies to control and increase advertisement, fast food corporations continue to target young kids forming the unhealthy and obsessed fast food diet that so many Americans struggle with today.

            Fast food is easy, filling; it’s convenient and inexpensive. Starting at a young age, school and work become extremely time consuming and we find ourselves taking more shortcuts everyday. Day to day problems like this is the reason fast food corporations target kids and they arguably use it to their advantage. Eric Scholosser mentioned in an interview with CBS news that “Fast food chains spend a large amount of marketing to get the attention of children. People form their eating habits as children so they try to nurture clients as youngsters” (Schlosser, 2).

            Personally, I could tell you from my own experience as a young obese American that my habits really started when I was about eight. Every Tuesday at McDonald's was “kids night” in my town. Now any kid will tell you that at that age, there’s nothing more fun than clowns, balloons and toys surrounded by the best chicken nuggets in town. Not to mention the gigantic play place, ball pit and secret tunnels that kept must of us kids coming back. Now I’m in college and nothings changed. Just yesterday I went to Chick-a-Filet here in Denver, which is a new spot for me. My jaw nearly dropped when I walked inside. For starters, this restaurant was packed beyond the extent of that I’ve ever seen McDonalds. To my right was a somewhat creepy eight-foot cow wearing a t-shirt saying, “eat mor chiken” with two little girls under his arms.  In their hands were two balloons, a toy, and a smile that would lead you to believe these girls just had the best meal of their life. Behind them was a brand new play place, opened last week with over ten interactive games, ball pits, mazes, tunnels, raffles and endless fun for the kids. It was evident that parents loved it too. The whole idea was pretty amazing and I couldn’t lie but say I was impressed.  They had narrowed down a perfect market to keep these kids coming back week after week with “healthier choices” in their chicken and endless entertainment for these kids that allow these parents to take a load off their shoulders and relax for a little bit.

            Another major factor that I saw and still see today is the large quantities of fast food advertising no matter where your going whether that’s from your couch at home or on vacation in a foreign country.  According to the L.A times In 2009 preschoolers saw 56% more ads for Subway, 21% more ads for McDonald’s and 9% more ads for Burger King, compared with 2007. Children age 6 to 11 saw even more: 59% more ads for Subway, 26% more for McDonald’s and 10% more for Burger King (Rochman, Szalavitz, and Park 1). It’s no doubt that fast food is heavy on fat, salt and sugar with little to none nutritional value yet it finds its appeal to almost everyone. In a study done by time health, they reported that “Researchers’ investigations also revealed that of 3,039 possible meal combinations intended for children (such as McDonald’s Happy Meal), only twelve met nutritional criteria the researchers set for preschoolers and 15 met the criteria for older children” (Rochman, Szalavitz, and Park, 1). What makes this statistic concerning is that it almost seems in todays society that easting fast food has become a routine for a majority of households. In the same study researches took this even further to narrow down individuals and the harm they’re doing to themselves.  One-third of children and teens reported consuming fast food at least once a week, and 16% to 17% of adolescents’ caloric intake came from fast food restaurants. On an average visit to a fast-food restaurant, teens ordered 800 to 1,100 calories in a single meal (Thirty percent of which came from saturated fat or sugar), which is half the recommended intake for adolescents. Now that the obesity rate among young children has doubled since 1970, I think it’s important that we as consumers identify the problem. 

            In my opinion, I think it comes from the big corporations like Mcdonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s and other chains that widely distribute around the world. McDonalds spent 4.2 Billion dollars in 2009 on advertisements to youth alone, which is a shocking number for me when I think about how small some of these ads can be (Shapiro, 1).

Think about Mcdonald’s happy meal. Taking a pathetic approach to its entire promotion, McDonalds has successful related to young kids on a similar level through these toys and cartoons that are continuing to raise generation after generation in an unhealthy lifestyle. A study reported by Times writer Meredith Melnick explains how wide-spread this has really become; although restaurants like McDonald’s and Burger King pledged to reduce marketing to kids, it’s pretty evident that this isn’t the case. McDonald’s alone has 13 different websites targeted at various age groups; one site, Ronald.com, is specifically designed for preschoolers. Together, McDonald’s family of websites got 365,000 unique visitors aged 12 or younger per month and 249,000 teen visitors (Rochman, Szalavitz, and Park 1).  After I logged on myself to see what this was all about for myself, it really became clear.  Using more than one rhetorical approach, Mcdonald’s has created these websites that are bringing kids in through fun games and activities that underlie the product their really selling you. The problem here is that these marketers are developing thousands of ads a month and each and every one of them are targeted to reach an audience as low as two years old! What’s even worse is the fact that these options are endless in ways to target young kids.

            Today over eight major fast food restaurants have produced Smartphone apps, providing another opportunity to reach young customers, anytime, anywhere. Additionally, marketers are even finding ways to target children directly at school making it inevitable to stumble across one of these advertisements. An estimated twenty percent of public schools sell branded fast food. Probably the most shocking example that I’ve ever come across came from a school in Seminole County in Florida. These students received report cards mailed home from the school in Ronald McDonald envelopes, with promises of a free happy meal for children with good grades. 

            These advertisements to kids that are in schools must go, and the companies should make an effort to limit its exposure to kids. I know when an issue like this comes up the first amendment comes to play, but Congress has shown before they will attempt to protect children from harmful speech. They attempted to protect children before, as Amitai Etzinoti  said that Congress “passed legislation attempting to shield children by controlling the content of the materials they could access. The most notable attempts, the Communications Decency Act of 199617 ("CDA ") and the Child Online Protection Act of 199818("COP A")” (Etizoni 5) As you can see congress has passed laws to protect children in the past and they need to pass new regulation now, with up to 33% of children being obese, according to the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry. (American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry.)

Advertisements aren’t the only problem problem that I see with the ongoing obesity problem. With so many parents being stripped of time they frequently they visit fast food joints to get a quick fix fast food meal for their family.  In my opinion these marketers are sharing equal responsibility when a mother condones fast food three to four times a week. Most youth do not have money for fast food, and often it is the parent that is helping fix their child’s craving.

            The end goal for these marketers is too simply improve their brand name and affinity to kids at an early age whether it’s through a colorful ad, a website with games, an app for mobile devices, or a toy from your favorite Disney movie. Using some of these different techniques, big corporate advertisers are effectively targeting more and more of America’s youth every day further complicating the obesity problem that we are trying to fight here in America. It’s critical that parenting plays an important role in preventing bad eating habits from developing in their kids at such an early age. But more importantly these companies need to be consciously aware of the impact that their advertisements are having.