Advertising and Branding

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Ever wonder if all those celebrity baby bumps and cute children in PG-13 movies, preteen TV shows, and populating the pages of Us and People magazine matter? Consider this article about the Pregnancy Boom at Gloucester High in Time magazine.

We say . . .

Speaking of My Beautiful Mommy (see post below), in study after study we see the impact of a culture for girls so toxic that such a book is touted unapologetically on national news shows, ensuring the author millions in new clientele and books sales. A recent media survey of 3000 women found that appearance and weight trumped disease as cause for women's concern -- 84% of the women surveyed felt they were overweight and 56% were concerned about diet/weight, while just 20% express concern about heart health and 18% about diabetes.

In 2007 plastic surgeons performed nearly 11.7 million cosmetic procedures in the U.S. alone, 91% of them on women. That’s a lot of women, and since 67% of the procedures were done on 19-50 year olds, that’s a lot of mothers. Enter the new children’s book, My Beautiful Mommy, aimed at answering all sorts of questions that children 4-7 may have about mom’s operation.

Eating Oil: “The War On Bugs” Sounds A “Pharm Alarm” About the Toxic History of American Agriculture

By Rob Williams

Read more about this book at Chelsea Green Publishing.

From kiten2cat12345 on YouTube:

"This is a simple, easy to understand, overview of the situation of media in America and where to go to find information and alternative sources.
I don't specifically mention the big media corporations, but if you are interested they are General Electric, Walt Disney Company, Viacom/CBS, Time Warner, and News Corporation.

Important Places You Should Go:
http://www.Stopbigmedia.com
http://www.COAnews.org
http://www.Freepress.net

From ACME Co-President Rob Williams on YouTube:

"What happens when you bring together 10 young Jordanians and 10 young Vermonters for eight months of cross-cultural conversation, media education, leadership training, digital storytelling production, and reciprocal three-week home stays in both countries? The answer: so much. Take a look..."

From Free Speech TV:

Recently there has been a lot of discussion on the ACME email list about Miss Teen South Carolina and her inarticulate response to a question about why some Americans can't find America on a map.

(You can see the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WALIARHHLII)

This got me to revisit something I wrote a few years ago. I think it's still relevant:

Its a Tuesday afternoon in March and I’m teaching a media literacy course at a small New England Unversity.

My class is a group of about 25. They are fairly lively and involved students as these things tend to go.

Multiple reactions abound to the youtube video showing Miss South Carolina, contestant for the Miss Teen USA pageant, fumbling over an answer to the question she received in the pageant's nod to intelligence. Some saw a scared teenager who couldn't find her words and these people rushed to protect her, as one would one's own child. Some saw the failure of the U.S. education system. Some saw stupidity, and compared her to our fumbling president. Some just felt sorry for the poor girl and depicted her as simply dealing with a brain white-out. Why so much attention?