Consumer kids

I have young kids. A boy just turned four, and a girl not yet two.

Even though they're littlies, the consumer culture is already out to get 'em. Kids TV is filled with adverts for plastic trashy toys and junky foods, and even the channels that have no ads have shows with toy tie-ins.

Everywhere you look, it seems the advertising execs and factory owners are doing their best to grab at my kids and make money from them.

It is working. I had to take away the Thomas The Tank Engine[TM] catalogue that came with my son's birthday presents - he was burning a hole in it with his eyeballs. Before the catalogue came he was enjoying reading his books. Then the catalogue took over.

Speaking of books, have you noticed how many kids' books have toy tie-ins? Most of my kids' books are related to TV series and toy lines. Theyre good books, but you do get sick of seeing the same thing over and over.

So you try to buy the 'classics'. No such luck in avoiding consumerism there. It seems Disney owns Winnie The Pooh[TM], Snow White[TM], The Little Mermaid[TM] (yes, it was a fairy-tale before Disney got its clutches on the story), and Peter Pan[TM].

Disney owns our daughters' daydreams...

I remember a friend of mine telling me about her four year old daughter's dress-up day at kindergarten. The kids were instructed to come dressed as their favourite storybook character.

You guessed it. A classroom of Disney Princesses[TM] appeared, all in identical costumes, presumably bought from K-Mart. Only my friend's daughter was different, dressed as her favourite Hairy McClary, in a costume her mother had made her.

Now, there's nothing wrong with wanting to be a princess. There's nothing wrong with Thomas The Tank Engine - minus the [TM]. And there's certainly nothing wrong with Winnie The Pooh. Some of the products for and associated with these characters are excellent, and my kids enjoy them. Some are real favourites.

But there is absolutely something wrong with a culture that saturates our kids with this stuff, by only a handful of acceptable mega-corporations, until our kids all churn out identical daydreams. Huxley's Brave New World - the world of dream conditioning and children grown in sterile bottles - never seemed more hideously real.

To ban, or not to ban - that is the question

I'm not saying that we should ban Disney[TM], and The Wiggles[TM], and Crayola[TM], and Play-Doh[TM], and Hi-5[TM], and McDonalds[TM], and Pumpkin Patch[TM], and Thomas The Tank Engine[TM]. Almost all of these have products and toys and entertainment that can be fun and interesting and rewarding for our kids.

Banning never solved anything. Just ask our American friends about prohibition.

What I'm saying is that perhaps, in this world of corporate saturation, we should choose the alternative, when the alternative exists.

Find a balance

Instead of Disney Princesses[TM], The Wiggles[TM] and Hi-5[TM] videos, maybe we should look for the older cartoons that were made before kids were seen as an endless pool of revenue for corporate high-flyers. My son recently discovered original Tom and Jerry cartoons - and he loves them! (I do too).

Better yet, take the kids outside to play in the fresh air. And if its raining, dig out some old CDs or LPs of fifties and sixties music, and tell the kids to put on a song and dance show for you. The old 'doo-wop' music, in particular, is great for kids to sing along to, and my kids love silly songs like "Octopus's Garden" by the Beatles.

Instead of McDonalds[TM], take them to a non-chain restaurant. Our kids love Circadian Rhythm, a vegan family-friendly cafe just a couple of kilometers from here. The people are friendly, they know us and our kids - and our money is going directly to a family, and not to some giant mega-company overseas somewhere.

Instead of commercial Play-Doh[TM], make your own. I'll post recipes in an upcoming post for both standard and gluten-free playdoh. Its cheap to make, and you can use it with a whole stack of cookie cutters and rollers that you probably already have in your kitchen drawer.

Instead of Thomas The Tank Engine[TM], why not take the kids outside with some footpath chalk, and draw some railway lines for them? They can play trains on the chalk lines. If you want to buy toys, there are a whole stack of generic wooden railway sets that fit with the 'Thomas' toys yet cost a small portion of the price. Your child will NOT know the difference. Or care.

Instead of buying new designer clothes for your kids at expensive shops like Pumpkin Patch[TM], search the secondhand shops, both online and in your neighbourhood. Ask friends, and build up a network of families that trade clothes. Kids need to get used to budgeting, no matter what their age, and clothing is a good place to start.

I know that my kids have too much of the [TM] stuff. They have heaps of luxury toys, and live in designer clothes - although this is largely thanks to a very generous grandmother rather than due to me!

Our world is filled with corporate, name-brand madness. Our kids grow up in this, and by the time they reach school-age they value themselves and build status depending on what they have, rather than who they are.

Having and not-having

Even when I was at school this was the case. I had a friend who used to dread 'no uniform day', because she had nothing to wear that would give her status. Another friend of mine loved it, because it gave her the chance to wear a $400 leather jacket her silly mother had bought her. One girl got lots of attention by her peers, the other was shunned. Such is the nature of teenage culture.

What do we want our kids to be?

In the end, whether we have the ability to shower our kids with trendy, expensive gifts or not, the question is - should we? I don't think we should. Our kids need to learn humility, moderation, budgeting, the value of possessions, and frugality. These values are what will give our kids real worth as adults, not the clothes they wear or the items they own.

Loving parents, great kids

Being a good parent is a balancing act. You feel like you're on a wire, and fate is throwing rocks at you that you have to dodge all the time. Our kids are not who we expected them to be. Society isn't what we expected it to be. The job of parenting doesnt stop when we go to bed at night, and it doesn't end when our kids go to school, or to university, or get married.

We do our best to be good role models, but all the time we find ourselves questioning who we are, and who we want to be. Maybe we need to remember that not only do we have the potential to change our kids, our kids too change and transform us. Just as we teach our kids humility and respect, they teach us those gifts as well.

Corporate culture is about profit, but family culture is about love. We love our children, and we do what we hope is best for them. Sometimes we fail, ad sometimes we struggle with the challenges in our own lives. That's what being a parent is all about too.

I hope, as my children grow older, I'll have taught them that you can be a train expert without the latest Thomas[TM] product. You can sing and dance without the latest Hi-5[TM] sing-a-long hits interactive DVD. And you can be a princess without a Disney Princess[TM] costume.

And if they make too much noise in the living room, we'll all head to the park and go swing on the swings. And no-one will ever trademark that.