Our Children Being Exploited

The nowadays society is primarily focused on gaining more and more profit. This is the main goal of every type of business and the consumer’s benefit is now scarcely taken into account. The managers are using different tricks in order to attract the population’s attention and interests towards their products. The innocent victims caught in this immense spider web they make are our very children. They are exploited by the society and only few can see how much damage this fact can bring in their way to maturity.

To start with, the managers use a subtle psychology that induces into everyone’s mind the idea that a certain product is what they really need. The population doesn’t actually realize that the different type of commercials convert their desire, which is not necessarily a need, into an urgent need. We might think that children are protected by their genuine innocence, but their innocence and naivety are exactly the ingredients needed for the business to grow. One of the domains that attract children is surely and without doubt, the toy field.

Curiously, ever since infancy they are indirectly taught to be proud because children learn this type of behavior from their parents. The essence of pride is the desire to have more and better than the others. It is well known and psychologists have proven that children tend to imitate the behavior they see around them and in the first years and their parents represent their role-models. So kids are no longer satisfied with simple toys their parents afford. Something inside them dictates to ask for more and for better. And of course the commercials are there to help. They manipulate children to scream, to cry in order to get what they "need". Improved toys generate bigger needs, and little money cannot satisfy these desires. This leads to deception and in some cases to aggressive behavior.

As a consequence, children learn from an early age what bitterness is, they are no longer happy playing with each other with simple toys, they are permanently in competition.

Another disadvantage comes from the fact that they get confused because of the large number of choices that comes regarding the type of toys they desire.

Secondly children are exploited in the sweets field. Following the same pattern, the business-owners involved are not concerned about the children’s health, their target is the profit. They use commercials that mislead; they present only the good part of the product, ignoring the side-effects that come in time. They talk about vitamins but hide the cancerous substances, they present the attractive and delicious flavors without informing about the excess of glucose and they produce sweets in brilliant and vivid colors without anything natural in them. These have short and long term consequences: dental caries, a premise for obesity and there is also a correlation with cancer. Children refuse to eat healthy food because their stomach is filled with sweets which give them the sensation they are satiated.

Another manipulating factor is globalization; these days each and every kid has to eat at least once a week at McDonald’s, not necessarily because the food is so good, but because every kid does it. It became a trend.

In addition, this generation of children is trapped inside the computerized world. The latest technology combined with the latest ideas of computer games has an enormous influence among these young lives. They are told through television and internet adds that these games will help them prepare for the real life and the violence that exists within it. Instead, these computer games induce a serious gradient of violence in their subconscious mind and above all, children can become addicted to playing the games.

This is not just a danger; it has already become a fact. A vast number of children gave up outdoor activities in favor of spending the day on a chair, in front of the computer, fighting to save the world, the virtual world. Further on, this leads to the loss of the ability to socialize and to a series of other damages, such as damaged eyes, lack of physical condition and aggressive behavior.

In the end, the whole problem is a matter of balance. Toys, sweets and computer games are not bad things in their nature, but the way they are promoted is. The key to the problem is moderation and dependable parents with eyes wide-open, aware of the dangers their children are exposed and who take action in order to bring harmony in their children’s growing process.