Corporate America has done a remarkable job of marketing to a generation hooked on brand identities. It is our responsibility as parents to make every effort to inform our children that they are being manipulated and economically stripped. Young people hate being controlled, by anyone or anything. If we educate youth and let them make their own decisions, their disdain for authority will save them - without the lectures they resent and ignore anyway.
Despite what they may say, children look to adults for guidance, but usually in the form of example. Your kids are watching you. Take a look at your own wardrobe and ask yourself how many of your clothes display a visible label indicating the manufacturer's or designer's name.When I see kids wearing Tommy Hilfiger's name emblazoned across their chests, two questions pop into my mind: How much is Tommy Hilfiger paying these kids to become human billboards? And whose name doesTommyHilfiger have on his chest? You already know the answers.
People used to buy brand names simply because a brand name could be trusted. In earlier times, when somuch shoddy merchandise made it to the marketplace, you wanted brand names on anything you bought so that you could make sure you were not buying junk. That is no longer the case. So many high-quality goods sell for limited prices that it's hard to dump junk on sophisticated American consumers.We don't need brand names to tell us that a sneaker or deodorant is good. Virtually everything you can buy in any respectable store is high quality.
Today, brand names perform a different, rather sad function. They provide a facade of self-esteem for young people, especially those in urban areas. Kids derive a sense of belonging by flaunting Calvin Klein's name on their clothes, drinking a certain brand of bottled water, or even wearing a car's hood emblem around their neck. For them, brands offer an "in" to the exclusive clubs they see advertised on TV. They believe the hype that if Brandy wears Maybelline, they should too. They become convinced that they can't be cool unless they're wearing Air Nikes advertised by Michael Jordan.
Wearing a shirt with a polo player embroidered on the front gives them the same sense of belonging as a college student who proudly wears his fraternity letters. They let their clothing speak for them by associating their identity with others wearing the same threads.
This kind of ostentatious consumerism is not as harmful to people who can afford it. But in the 'hood, these brand names are literally killing us. In the 1980s and early 1990s we heard tragic stories of young children being gunned down so someone could steal their brand-name sneakers. Brand names are killing us financially as well. Buying brand-name items is an inner-city addiction as much as a suburban one - and it's become almost as costly as heroin.
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Note: This article was sent to us by: Leah A. Ermingstone at 06022010
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