Damire Canada-Mendez

With today's ever-changing technology rules, companies have been forced to develop alternate advertising strategies in order to get their products out to the consumer. With DVR and TiVo available, the consumer has the option of fast forwarding through commercials, hence other advertising strategies need to be developed.

Many product companies have turned to advertising within television shows, better known as placement marketing, counting on the star power of celebrities to encourage consumers to buy products.

All brands from Coca-Cola and computers to cars and even gum have been placed cleverly in TV shows.

There seems to be, however, a disturbing trend of targeting children, tweens and teens with messages about sex. Every network is guilty of this trend, but on a personal note I believe that ABC Family has gone above and beyond with this trend and it is not right.

ABC Family’s target audiences are demographics of 10-18 years of age; nevertheless the shows they air are definitely targeted toward a much older audience.

Shows like ‘The Secret Life of the American Teenager’ and ‘Pretty Little Liars’ are shows targeted towards the 11-18 demographic. It is a reality of society that teenagers these days have sex early into their teenage years, because of peer pressure among many situations. These shows, like many others from the network, partake in advertising products on the show but what seems to be the number one product that these shows are advertising is sex.

During the 80’s and 90’s, shows that were targeted towards this demographic advertised drinks, cars and products for the targeted demographic, along with dealing with typical issues that teens and such have to deal with on a daily basis.

As a twenty-four year old I feel like the shows target my age group, but according to the network, I’m not a proposed target. Regardless, dialogue such as, ‘if you don’t have sex while you are in high school you are nobody’ strikes me as over the top.

‘The Secret Life of the American Teenager’ though it is supposed to send the message that having sex in high school has complicated consequences like pregnancy, the main product being advertised on the show is sex.

In the show ‘Pretty Little Liars’ the main product being advertised again is sex. On this show, teenage girls are getting involved with their teachers and boys much older than them. It is one thing to advertise teacher-student relationships on collegiate shows or movies where consenting adults have relationships, but to do so on teen shows is just plain wrong.

It is interesting that at a younger age I felt like older people always blew this kind of dilemma out of proportion, but now as twenty-four year old I feel like the targeted audience is too young to have sex advertised on their favorite shows. It is true that today most companies have campaigns under the motto ‘sex sells’, but selling sex on kid’s shows is a new low.

I have a thirteen year old cousin that watches these shows and while talking to her she asked me if I had ever had the type of relationship Aria and Mr. Fritz (characters from ‘Pretty Little Liars’) have when I was her age. I was shocked when my thirteen year old cousin asked this, because a girl her age should not be thinking about having sex with her English teacher.

ABC Family should drop the ‘Family’ part of their name or reconsider the product these shows are really advertising. Maybe the network should reconsider the type of shows they put on the ‘Family’ version of their adult geared networks.

At what age do you think kids can fully understand how sex plays into relationships?

Graphic Credit:
Animationfactory.com