English 110

Fast Food Marketing
Starting from Disney’s success, the marketing targeting to children has exploded in recent decades. As another pioneer, McDonald, one of the biggest fast food manufacturers and advertiser, invests a huge block of fund on various advertisements every year. Children now live in these advertisements and become the members of their customer group. The fast food then brings high calories, causing them fat. Is the story simple enough to say that the fast food marketing should be banned? My view is, the responsibility is not only on the marketing, but mainly on the communication and education from the parents, and the response of the government to the endless marketing. In <Your trusted friends>, the author Eric Schlosser reports that “Many studies had found that young children often could not tell the difference between television programming and television advertising. They also could not comprehend the real purpose of commercials and trusted that advertising claims were true.” This is one of the most important reasons, according to him, that fast food industry should be banned to market at children. I don’t deny that children can’t protect them from ads, but they can be influenced not only from the fast food, but also a video game, a nice snack, or even the sex and violence( if nobody controls that). Why don’t parents tell them “this is an advertisement. It is not true!” just like that they tell kids the fire is dangerous? Why doesn’t the government show a health warning after each advertisement just like the tobacco ads? The fast food just acts what it should act as a business, like most other business does. Their responsibility is just choosing a best way to abstract customers, either children or adults. Furthermore, the parents’ should take the responsibility on supervising their kids. In <Your trusted friends>, a manufacturer of “playlands” explains the perfect synergy between McDonald and them: “Playlands bring in children, who bring in parents, who bring in money.” What are these for? Schlosser then answers, “As American cities and towns spend less money on children's recreation, fast food restaurants have become gathering spaces for families with young children.” McDonald builds their kingdom with such a lot of playgrounds and toys. However, as parents, why do they choose to spend time with their children here, instead of other meaningful places? The current status in the society is that most parents have to work, in which case they can’t have enough energy to think about how to educate the kids, which they have to. So they choose a simpler way—to satisfy their requirement that comes from the fast food ads: eat, eat, eat... they even have a playland and toys! What an amazing place to save time! Your kids can enjoy the food, play there, and get free toy—ignoring the calorie things for a while, we can spend more time on diet from tomorrow. Beside this, I am not saying that the fast food industry is so innocent and takes no responsibility on children’s obesity. The manufactures create a boundless marketing ocean in the fields among people’s life so that they can’t escape from it. As Schlosser reminds, “The competition for young customers has led the fast food chains to form marketing alliances not just with toy companies, but with sports leagues and Hollywood studios. McDonald's has staged promotions with the National Basketball Association and the Olympics. Pizza Hut, Taco Be IL, and KFC signed a three-year deal with the NCAA. Wendy's has linked with the National Hockey League.” In this case, wherever the parents take their kids to is in the marketing ocean that they can’t jump out of. In conclusion, my view on the fast food marketing to kids is, they should not be banned, but should be control by government. Meanwhile, parents should be more responsible to their kids to help them create a correct outlook on life.