Obesity ad links junk food and junkies

It’s a fair analogy. We need some shock around this topic – it’s a massive issue in our society. *Health* care needs more focus on *healthy* living; then we wouldn’t need to spend so much money and personal heartache trying to “fix” sick people.

The fast/convenience/snack food people have dominated mainstream media for so long because… well, that’s where the money is – but how much are problems like obesity costing society?

I’m keen to hear parents’ responses to this. I feel like empathy might be a more effective way in than accusation. I know if I made this insinuation to any Mum I know, I’d be told to go fuck myself. If I recognised their difficulties and offered some tools to help plan their kid’s diet, different story.

That said, I applaud the seriousness with which the issue has been addressed. Pretty powerful stuff.

Oh that is quite a sick ad! Especially the part where you think she is going to inject him, I felt a little sick by it! It definetely had it desired effect.

Wow, that is confronting.

Some advertising exec is telling me that feeding my kids junk food is tantamount to child abuse. What a load of uneducated rubbish. Any nutritionist will tell you that occasional junk food in fine if your child is otherwise eating well and exercising.

Of course, if The Precinct had have put together an ad saying “if you feed your kids junk food every now and then, be sure to make sure the rest of their meals are balanced and nutritious and they get lots of exercise”, then no one would have taken any notice.

This kind of over the top pseudo-scientific “expertise” that people spout has only one concrete effect – to convince parents who are actually doing a good job at raising their kids that they’re negligent and abusive. Because that’s how “experts” sell books, get on TV and get publicity in the press – by convincing people that it’s their way or armageddon.

Grim reaper?

what a ridiculous ad. Shock tactics are fine but heroin – spare me please. it’s just so far from a realistic link as there can be. Anotehr burger please – and extra cheese, just like the ad.

This is powerful stuff and I guess I must be very susceptible to ‘top pseudo-scientific “expertise” because it the desired effect on me.

Yes it’s full on and a bit over the top, but it’s trying to have an impact. I’m a mum and it doesn’t make me feel negligent and abusive, but it does make me think twice.

Don’t you think mothers feel guilty enough about their kids’ diets without being accused of child abuse every time they pick up a take away?

Can’t ad agencies think of another strategy besides maternal guilt?

My issue with such campaigns is the paucity of evidence to show that there is a casual link between advertising and childhood obesity. One oft quoted Australian university study drew its conclusions based on the number of HFHS (high-fat / high-sugar) ads BROADCAST on Free-To-Air TV (in an extremely selective and short time period). What it did NOT factor in was that the actual child VIEWING levels had decreased over the past decade with the BMI had increased.

If – and I stress IF – there is a univariate relationship between TV advertising and childhood obesity, if the BMI is increasing while the ad viewing is decreasing then the relationship would appear to be in the inverse – the LESS ads for HFHS they see the fatter they get. (This relationship has been seen in other countries such as Canada which either severely restricted or banned HFHS ads to kids but the BMI continues to climb).

The fact is, that this is a multivariate problem. There is no single cause. There are many factors involved, and there was an excellent paper written in South Australia (University of South Australia I seem to recall) that concluded that Internet usage (a very sedentary activity) was the highest correlate to high BMI in kids, and also way up the scale was the number of incomes in the home (dual income homes tend to have less childhood supervision).

If only all this scare-tactic money was put into robust research into causes of childhood obesity the kids would be better off! (And don’t start me on the seriously flawed BMI – for example, most Brownlow medallists of the last decade are ‘overweight’ according to the BMI).

@dm – Heroin kills, as does obesity. Heroin is addictive, as is junk food…. But I dare say that obesity related illnesses costs society a damn sight more money and lives each year than the comparable costs of heroin!

My god, what a shocking piece indeed.
But shock in the way it should be used in advertising, to deliver a message and get debate started on what is indeed a serious issue.
The use of the “junk” analogy is brilliant, far more powerful than “smack” which would have course taken things in a softer direction.

Oh, and as an Art Director the spot is beautifully shot

This is a cynical and disgraceful piece of self promotion. What we are seeing in the ad is nothing less than child abuse. It’s agencies like this that give the advertising industry a bad name. I bet they’d jump at the chance to work on the next McDonalds campaign if they were paid enough.

This is absolute garbage.

The Precinct should be ashamed.

People wonder why advertising get’s a bad wrap sometimes- this is why..

Hey! Lets find something that’s legal and totally safe in small quantities- and compare it to injecting drugs into your child’s arm! Well done geniuses.

Hope you don’t have any food clients.

Where would we be without the government to tell us what to put into our bodies!!??

And big slap on the back to all the ad industry toadies who facilitate this totalitarianism.

How thoroughly ironic having the most notorious drug abusers in society lecturing us on how to live our lives.

Wow look at all those obnoxious agencies slamming this because they rely on their big budgets from selling junk to kids.

This is a brilliant ad, giving kids junk food is child abuse.

I don’t agree that we should stop advertisers from marketing junk to kids, I believe the law needs to be changed so that it is unlawful to sell junk food / soft drinks / processed food to children.

It is scientifically proven that junk food at an early age can do signficiant irreversable damage.

I’m loving it

This is gold. Those “parents” who are whinging about how guilty it made them feel: well it SHOULD. You SHOULD feel guilty for stuffing your helpless children with that rubbish. Does the occasional burger hurt them? well not significantly but the research shows those who choose to eat at “family restaurants” like Macdonald’s do NOT just do it occasionally but regularly. The environment in these places is created to develop an underlying psychological dependence ie playgrounds, toys and advertising and therefore should be avoided at all costs. Its no more horrifying than the seatbelt ads or the drink driving ads. I do agree this is not the only cause, environmental effects also contribute to OW&OB in children but this is a good start. And spare me the riposte, I AM a parent AND tertiary educated in the nutrition field.

Anonymous @ 5:08 pm
“giving kids junk food is child abuse.”

What a load of utter shit. I’m sorry. It’s comments like this that turn the whole debate on one side into a joke.

Letting your child get to an obese level is cruel, no one is arguing that. But this idea that its the big bag fast food giant who’s behind it all is totally off the mark.

What happened to parents having some responsibility in what goes into their childs mouths? Or maybe even saying NO once in a while?

WOW! That really hits home!
It’s about time more stuff like this gets up-rooted. This material needs to be in our faces so potentially people start taking action and the PARENTS GET THE MESSAGE!! Can’t they see it all stems from them.

lets hope that the people here objecting to the idea that feeding kids junk food is child abuse don’t have kids of they are responsible for. Lets hope they don’t encourage them to smoke, or feed them sugar loaded soft drinks either. And lets hope their kids don’t turn out as stupid as they are.

What is really sickening are arguments from pompous twats who can’t manage to put a cogent argument in plain language and reach for their tattered Thearus to try and make up for their lack of ability to apply logic.

I mean c’mon John Grono if you want to make a contribution try and make it a comprehensible one instead of trying to compensate for your limitations with $2 words.

OK John. I will dumb it down to 2 cent words for you.

1. Kids are seeing less TV ads for ‘junk food’ than they were 10-20 years ago.
2. Kids BMI continues to increase.
3. Countries like Canada with strictly controlled or banned ‘junk food’ ads also see increasing BMI.

At the same time:

4. Kids internet usage is growing rapidly.
5. Homes with both parents working tend to have kids with a higher BMI.
6. University of South Australian studies show these are the two most likely cause of the increase in kids BMI.

None of the above indicate that advertising ‘junk food’ is causing an increase is kids BMI. It appears that parents controlling how much time their kids spend on the computer and the internet when they could have been playing in the backyard – coupled with being there to cook healthy meals for their kids instead of the convenience of a quick burger would have much greater impact than such ad campaigns.

Apologies for the ‘limitation’ of being knowledgeable rather than ignorant on such an important issue.

@impressed – lots of people give their kids junk food occasionally. Pretty much every parent I know falls into that category.

It’s interesting that you concded that occasional junk food intake does not harm kids, and let’s note here that you’re a nutritionist (your post mainly focuses on the separate but related issue of how junk food is marketed, which is not what this ad is getting at).

So, let’s just reiterate here. Occasional eating of junk food in all its forms (burgers, chips, whatever) is not evil and will not harm your kids. That’s not the message that you take away from this hysterically (both in the literal sense, and in the “very funny” sense) over the top ad.

John Grono dumb it down all you want, at least you’re comfortable now. You are still being pompous and your argument is crap.

If we had moved against cigarettes when we had a strong suspicion they were harmful many grandparents, mothers and fathers of ours would have been spared miserable deaths.

If we had started to practice safe sex when we had a strong suspicion that unsafe practices led to aids many more would have been spared miserable deaths.

We have a strong suspicion that obesity, to which fast food is a major contributor, will result in future miserable and unnecessary deaths.

If we have learned anything from cigarettes and aids it is to act when we have a strong suspicion and not listen to morons who demand irrefutable proor while people die around them.

If we are wrong I will kneel at the feet of the people who I think are merchants of death. I will kneel at the feet of their apologists too.

Will you do the same for me?

And the winner for pompous statement of the year on Mumbrella is …. pass the envelope please ….

“I will kneel at the feet of the people who I think are merchants of death”/

Congratulations John, top effort!!!

Clever John Grono – avoid the argument, avoid the challenge, just try unsucessfully to be clever. Oh, and show you don’t really know what ‘kneeling at the feet’ really means.

All words, no substance.

John GronoFocus on the argument, you’re clearly not clever enough for sarcasm.

After being caught in the grips of a McDonalds addiction in 2005 I managed
to kick the terrible affliction.

They released this card in conjunction with the Bowling Green Tavern, which
simultaneously entitled to the bearer to $5 jugs at the pub and, wait for
it, a free big mac with any super combo purchase.  So, i would order a
double cheese burger (as in two of them, not a double layered one) which
would come with large fries and a large coke and a free big mac, all for
the price of about NZ$5.95!  Get in, Son!  I would wolf one of those
puppies down before going out for a night tearing up the floor at the Cook.

Anyway, i decided to go for as long as i could without eating McDonalds.  I
think i made it about 4 months, and then, one day after having a tough day
at lectures, no doubt learning the exceptions to some rule of admissibility
in Evidence i couldn’t take it any more and i decided to go and get myself
a fix.  And i did.

So I went to McDonalds, full of self-loathing and disappointment in myself
for falling off the wagon.  I ordered some huge pile of burgers, chips and
some sweet full-strength coke – none of that diet or zero methadone coke.
It was sooo good.  I vividly recall it hitting my system after a few
minutes.  It was like that scene in Trainspotting when he takes a hit and
melts backward into the carpet and Born Slippy kicks in.  The combination
of saturated fats, massive amounts of sodium, ooodles of sugar combined to
give me some ultimate rush, only comparable to some kind of opiate i’d
imagine.

Following the consumption, i stumbled out onto George Street.  My head was
pounding and my senses distorted from the junk coursing through my veins.
I felt unable to process logical thoughts.  I think i weaved my way home
and had a nap, mostly because it was probably my 3pm nap time i always had
as a student, by also bought on more acutely on account of the post Maccas
consumption malaise i had been thrown into.  You don’t wanna be around a
junk food junkie when the comedown hits.  You’d get as much sense out
Barney at a quantum physics conference.

I remember having McDonalds as a small lad.  We had our Old Boys’ under 8s
break-up at Merrivale McDonalds and our star player snapped his arm on the
Hamburglar springy apparatus.  I have some sympathy for the plight of the
addicted.  In my opinion this campaign, while shocking in some respects, is
appropriate.

@John Grono – at which point in the commercial does it try to make a link between advertising (of junk food) and obesity? Yes, the most obvious target in the commercial is junk food as the cause of childhood obesity, but I think you may have taken a presumptuous leap and steered the debate to where you were able to regurgitate your own research.

The other, and more important, target in the spot is clearly the parents. This is an issue beyond junk food – it’s about duty of care. John Grono, you suggest that parents need to monitor how much time their kids are on the interent, plus be around to cook more healthy dinners. So it seems to me that we’re all talking about the same thing. All the commercial is doing is literally asking a question – you wouldn’t harm you kids one way, so why would you harm them another? It’s a question posed directly at the parents/guardians, and asks them to consider their choices when it comes to their diet. Sure, the imagery is strong and perhaps over the top, but it’s an analogy that gets my attention and causes me to take pause and consider the debate.

Hmm, it seems that Australia is full of people who are unable to look in the mirror to see how fat they are, instead they need a bureaucrat in Canberra to tell them.

Never mind size 0 vegans will be subject to stool inspection next week, just in case eh?

Mike = loser.

From clever to not clever in 2 minutes – make up your mind!

Is childhood obesity an issue? Of course it is.

Will ads like this do anything to address the problem? No (IMHO).

Is childhood obesity inextricably linked to societal issues – increased usage of computers and the internet coupled with a lack of exercise and activity, especially as economic pressures mandate the necessity for dual-income homes? Yes.

In hindsight, should cigarettes have ever been allowed on the market? No.

Is your AIDS comment understandable? No – I never realised that this horrific disease was a product being peddled by businesses, silly old me eh.

Do cars kill people? If we had have known that every year in Australia there would be 600,000 reported crashes resulting in over 200,000 injuries, 22,000 long term injuries and 1,700 deaths would we have let the car on our roads? (c.f. 172 deaths from obesity in 2006 in Australia – latest data I could find). The fact is that life includes risk – it cannot be eliminated no matter how much good intent we may have.

So, what about cancer? Dementia? Heart disease? Starvation in third world countries? Children dying from lack of clean drinking water? All these are horrible deaths as well.

So, where do we draw the line? Well, I draw it at equating feeding a child a hamburger with administering an addictive illegal drug.

Heroin: it’s as harmless as a cheeseburger.

/facepalm

Too sad to watch – Way too extreme

Agreed DGM. Fair point.

I still think it has over-stepped the mark. And no I don’t work for Macca’s etc. Just spent a LOT of time studying the links between HFHS advertising and childhood obesity – they appear to be societal – and I jumped in to defend our industry. I suppose it’s my dislike of regulation (when based on wrong premises) that got me fired up.

John Grono @ 9:38 you prove the point about not being clever enough for sarcasm by missing it.

Further proof of limited communication skills lies in suggesting that I say that aids was peddled by business. The point was that when we suspect something is harmful lets stop doing it, at least until we are sure one way or the other.

Be careful as you go about your day JG -being clever enough to get dressed does’nt necessarily mean you’re clever enough to go out.

Simple solution to childhood obesity = Get kids addicted to heroin.
Seriously.
Have you ever seen a fat smackie?

That’s all the level of analysis and comment this cynical ad deserves.

Thank John, my new life guru. I will dress very carefully from now on. I simply could not have got through my day without that life advice. I feel so much more enlightened now. Ommmmmm.

This ad will never be seen by the people who it claims to target, which is just as well as it would be counterproductive to its aims. The ad so vastly overclaims on its core proposition it makes the viewer doubt there is any real substance to the argument and is simply an extremist rant.

This is what happend to climate debate. The claims by activists that the world was as good as done for if we didn’t all start wearing sack cloth and the subsequent outing of dodgy methodology means people are now less likely to consider gloabl warming an imminent threat desearving of immediate action.

Again I say shame on this agency for a cynical exercise in exploitation and self promotion. I suggest if the people who made this ad truly belive it they should head out to Macarthur Shopping Centre and play it on a loop and explain to the mums and dads coming out of Maccas. I’d watch a video of that.

John Grono since you have completely avoided a response to the points I have raised I assume you agree with them and in future your contributions to such debates will be considered, clearly articulated and you will desist from clogging our mental arteries with pompous crap.

Every problem is multivariate, even your communication one.

Hey John-Of-No-Surname, tell me … does it echo in the hall of mirrors?

You will (all) be pleased to know that I suspect that this will probably my last comment on this thread (cheers from the crowd!) as I’m hungry and I’m going to get a burger for lunch – so I will probably be dead by around 5pm. I promise I will do a little genuflect for you when I croak it.

Arrivederci.

dope ad, pun intended.

@ Jo Average, to your comment ‘Grim reaper?’ – must agree it is very reminicent of Siimon Reynolds fantastic ad!

My god you people who’s side are you on? It’s a brilliantly made ad that’s powerful, controversial and to the point! It is extreme yes, it is designed to be controversial yes, but the whole idea is to make you stop and think, it needs to make such an impact that it has the desired effect – which is to make parents think about what they put in their childs mouth. Which 5 year old is going to chose vegetables over a burger? It’s the parents responsibility to teach their children at a young age to make the right choices. You should be applauding such a worth while cause not going out of your way to point out how harmless junk food is!

@Eek I was still laughing about “fat smackies” an hour later. Made my day.

@lou. I’m on the side of common sense. This ad will make parents stop and think – but not about junk food. It will make them think ,who is the d*%khead who made this crap ad and how dare they compare an avaerage mum to someone who would inject heroin into a child.

Controversy doe not equal effectiveness. Whose side are you on?

@Gezza. Well if it makes them think at all, even if only to say what a d&%khead, then it’s done some good. If you love something or you hate something it will make an impression either way. I’m sure lot’s of mums will disagree with this ad and think it’s disgusting but you can also be damn well sure they’ll think just that little bit harder before they swing past maccas to pick up a happy meal for tea just because it’s cheap and easy. And that my friend = job well done.

In conclusion (that’s enough from me), it’s good to see a solid cohort of people on here who are sick of being told what bad parents they are all the time by “experts” who are just pedalling their own products. Keep up the good fight, kids.

Mr Argen take head out of arse, see light.

fair point

Woah, that’s pretty hard core! It has got us all talking about it though so objective on the way to being achieved I guess.

But is it really “junk” food thats to blame for childhood obesity?

I have just watched the ad and read thru the comments and it seems weird to me that not one person has seen the link to diabetes and the ritual of injecting for that purpose.
It seems like such a lost opportunity that they have gone with the extreme ‘heroin’ inference rather than the far more relevant diabetes/injecting implication.
The second I saw the needle, I thought, oh how clever, they are going to infer the heroin thing but the twist will be diabetes… but no… they just did the heroin thing for basic shock value.

Another ad along a similar theme, but this time by vegetarians!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqebzAWv0hI

Or maybe your burger eating kid will grow up like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrfM0z0Xx_E that’s even more shocking

Okay here is a plan. Every fast Food Meal Sold that has over 1500 calories should carry a 50c tax that is then invested back into Kids sport/activities.

OK then. All that ad is doing is trying to get a rise out of the viewer. It’s overly sensational. And not very clever. Life is about choices. We all make them based on experiences. Choices are NOT inherently bad or good, they are options. Everyone has them. Just like something else hey? Pretty over-the-top if you ask me…

The cricket will be ablaze with KFC ad’s this coming ashes series. Libby Trickett will be beaming a big fat smile all the way to the bank.

Apparently the cancer rate is creeping up, at a disturbing rate of knots.

Many say that the toxins in our bodies are at all time highs and a massive factor is diet.

Our grandparents were from old stock (mine were born in the late teens early 1920’s) they both smoked like chimneys, yet lived to 82 and 96… They ate very good food, which was not pumped full of cr@p…

Pottenger has a great theory on this and so did a German doctor called Gerson. – Google it…

I am all for the fast food tax…

Why should food that is bad for us be cheaper than food that is good?
Why has the focus gone onto exploiting weaknesses in human behavior instead of making it better whether they like it or not?

I know alot of us in here are timepoor and feel the need to justify eating poorly.

I make time to go to the markets most weekends. Kids love cooking…heck I remember being in charge of the gravy for weekend roasts, I was the potato peeler and masher..I was even in the garden tossing soil and harvesting veges from the garden patch we had.

For those out there that have never grown their own food …you are missing out. You can smell a tomato bush from up to 50 m away…when was the last time you got that at a supermarket. You struggle to control bugs and animals such as bats as they sense the nutritional foods. Put a supermarket tomato there and you will be lucky if the animals eat it….why the heck are we?

It is disturbing to me that the ‘fresh food’ section is getting smaller and smaller. That diet food is processed. That diet food actually can and does make you put on weight in some instances. That so many foods in the process of lasting longer and looking better have the traces of pesticides and poisons to kill bugs still in them when we eat them.

Since when did putting in a synthetic ingredient….that may have 100 components of which the body picks and chooses to process….become a priority over say an Apple with up to 14000 components of which science has only categorized 6500 and the rest they have no idea about. The body takes the natural 100% of the time.

Why is there such a reliance on Corn products which happen to be one of if not the most genetically modified/human created crop known to civilization?

Ask yourselves out there before bagging this campaign….what are you really eating? Ask yourself, if you are a manufacturer or sell manufactured products, how many extra ingredients do you have to put into foods just to give it some sort of nutritional value. You have got to be kidding if you think there is not an epidemic of nutrition problems in society.

Up to 80% of people are nutritionally deficient……fat or not! Putting on weight in a lot of cases is because of this phenomenon…and we ‘treat’ it with meal replacements. Um do you not think that is treating the problem?

The problem is not fat….the problem is societal mis-education and loss of life skills such as cooking.

Good real food and wholefoods are the solution. Learning how to source, prepare and eat them is your duty and the duty of every parent to teach this to their kids.

Enough said.

Very well said Mike!

I just had a discussion with somebody selling pink gifts for breat cancer awareness.

I asked her if her organisation campaigned to reduce, or even ban processed foods, smoking, alcohol, pollution etc or did they educate people to eat organic food and avoid toxins? She looked at me as if I were a nutter…

I am not knocking her charity, they do lots of research and offer support to cancer sufferers. nevertheless I feel that there are many charities that are merely bandaids to the problem. ‘Research on how to remove a lump” – what about not causing the lump in the first place?

There are ad agencies who are effectively contradictions; (supporting a fast food company on the one hand and then offering their services for free to a cancer charity on the other) – the world has gone mad…

Governments will act soon (because otherwise their health systems will see them go bust) and we just might see us being encouraged to eat good food, exercise and avoid toxins in every cause. (It has started with the smoking bans…) Slowly but surely…

@Ian
I was under the impression that breast cancer, in particular, is caused mainly due to a genetic predisposition ie: one’s mother, sister, aunt, father having previously suffered from it. I have never heard of someone ‘causing the lump’ in regard to breast cancer ever before!
But please enlighten me if this is actually the case…

Alison, I think common medical wisdom agrees with what you say.

However, I came across this article suggesting that cancer became much more prevalent only a few hundred years ago coinciding roughly with the Industrial Revolution … http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sci.....mmies.html

The jury is definitely out on that one, but and interesting read.

CANCER OF ENJOY

Is it just me, or is there a new 21st century Cancer that invades all things enjoyable. After a very short time this new Cancer makes us believe that the enjoyable things (smoking, drinking, eating fast food, talking on the cell phone hybrid tomatoes, cheese, onions etc) are all short cuts to a visit to the oncologist. Once these are all confirmed with the scientific certainty of global warming then it’s just a matter of time before they are all banned. I can see looming on the horizon a ban on sex as that of course is a contributing factor to cervical cancer.

I’m off home to see the wife before it’s banned. Talk Monday.

@Alison. Hi Alison, genetics is believed to be a factor in breast cancer. John G is on the mark too with his post, as is the other person who mentioned about Pottenger and Gerson.

R Mugombe I do not share your taste of fun. I cant stand cigarette smoke, it makes me cough, gives me bloodshot eyes. Fast food simply makes me feel sick. I would go a nice organic chook with fresh organic veggies any day.

This is interesting and current http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11607394