Elisa's Journal

Joe Camel Meets Joe Boxer
Are We Raising Brand Followers
by
Elisa Medhus, MD
Author of Raising Children Who Think for Themselves

Our lives are getting more hectic by the day, and with five kids, mine often approaches tornadic proportions. One afternoon in particular, my to-do list seemed even more overwhelming than usual. In my panic-tinged reverie, I imagined Tom Cruise examining the errand list on my Palm Pilot, then, looking shaken and dismayed, hurling the offending instrument of torture over a cliff as it bursts into flames. Needless to say, my outlook on life that day was jaded enough to hurl my sense of humor into the throes of a deep coma. Nevertheless, the Errand Gods kept pestering me. And for once, I was actually scheduled to revamp my own wardrobe instead of everyone else’s. (Something about the kids suddenly asking to be dropped off three blocks from school and complete strangers dropping change in my coffee cup raised my suspicions.)
As I was pawing through a rack of clothes, (while simultaneously planning dinner, considering topics for tomorrow’s PTA meeting and balancing my checkbook in what’s left of my mind,) I noticed that almost everything had the name of some la-de-da designer. Why, I wondered, would I want someone else’s name emblazoned across my chest? I’m not about to pace the sidewalk wearing boards persuading pedestrians to “Eat at Joe’s” without getting paid handsomely for the humiliation. So why on earth would I pay Mr. Abewhosits and Fitchamacallit to advertise their wares? The pickings were slim in the nondesigner department, so I left in my fraying jeans and yellowing t-shirt, thinking maybe I should tackle my shopping when I regained at least a modicum of mental and emotional wherewithal.
After that experience, I started noticing the clothes my own five children were wearing. Had I gone mad? Had I lived in a complete fog? Had I developed a terminal case of amnesia? Because I don’t remember buying all those shirts with Mr. Mossimo’s, Mr. Gap’s and Mr. Dickie’s names written all over them. Then, vague memories of shopping expeditions with the kids began to surface. My kids had shown a preference for designer brands. They had insisted that wearing Target or Kmart brands would scar them for life, cause them to be rejected by all of humanity so that they’d have not recourse but to go mental, turn into serial killers and cost me a fortune in legal and psychotherapy bills. Time after time, their pleas wore me down to a point where having bamboo splinters shoved under my fingernails started to sound comforting. So I had allowed my kids to fall for the designer label trap I so detested. I asked myself, ‘why have kids today become such brand loyalist and even more important—was that so bad?’
My soul searching and observations led to some troubling conclusions. The fact that kids worship certain brands isn’t the troubling issue here—why they do and what additional effects this has on their lives is! Human nature uncovered the why’s behind it all. Like dogs and wolves, we’re all pack animals, and children have an even stronger pack mentality than adults. For that reason, we have a strong instinct to belong…to be accepted by a group. At first glance, that doesn’t seem so bad, but, since we’re also reasoning animals, we can think of all sorts of ways—harmful and healthy—to fulfill that instinct. The healthy way to gain acceptance is to earn it. To come up with a unique contribution or carve out a meaningful role that benefits the pack. Those who choose this option don’t have to shape their choices according to outside opinion or make their decisions contingent on whatever will win them the most approval. In other words, they’re free to choose according to their own standards, not the pack’s. With pack acceptance already in the bag, these kids can wear or buy what they like. Even high water pants and Hush Puppies are fair game. They can decide which music they like, how much they want to weigh, how they want to wear their hair, who they want to have for their friends, and what set of values they want to call their own. Such is the reward for thinking for themselves rather than delegating that job to others. These are the self-directed.
But most kids—in fact most people—choose to fulfill that pack animal instinct by begging for acceptance. In other words, they conform to pack standards instead of creating and following their own. To make sure the pack is pleased with them, these kids have to be on the constant lookout for external cues from their peers and the pop culture they worship to gauge how accepted they are and what trends are in. Then, with very little introspection, they make their choices according to what will win them the most approval. In other words, their choice-making is an external process hopelessly coupled to peer opinion. These are the externally directed.
So big deal, you say? What’s the problem with kids following peer and pop culture standards instead of their own? After all, don’t we adults do the same? It is a problem—not because of a blind allegiance to certain brands, but because the mentality behind it is a symptom of something more ominous—a cultural and moral disease this symptom represents.
External direction has been perpetuated in children for centuries thanks, in part, to the two parenting mistakes we’ve been programmed to make for generations:
1. We program our kids from birth to seek our approval.
2. We discourage introspection in our kids, so they aren’t very good at weighing the pros and cons, considering the alternatives and pondering the consequences for a moral choice.
To add insult to injury, the Digital Age has pervaded our kids’ lives with more external messages, through more channels, with more intensity and at younger ages than ever before—messages that tell them what to wear, how much to weigh, who to be, what to think, how to act, what friends to choose. They’re even told how long their should wear the straps on their backpacks! (And better make it a Land’s End backpack lest your kid be banished to the middle school’s intramural leper colony.) This merciless flood of information not only cattle prods our kids into various trends, it leaves little opportunity for the quiet reflection they need to think. And guess which messages have the most impact. Yep, Ethnie, Nike’s, Marlboro—companies with the marketing budgets big enough to broadcast brainwashing messages at unprecedented decibels.
Add this to the fact that we’ve turned them into unthinking, externally directed approval seekers, and we have kids who, when their pack changes from family to peer groups, learn to seek peer approval and follow pop culture standards. Never mind how far those stray from the morals we’ve tried to instill. So, if they become involved with a peer group that values acting tough, bullying, smoking, using drugs or alcohol, being promiscuous, or cursing, they can be persuaded to make some pretty rotten choices! In other words, by being externally directed, our children’s futures often hinge on who or what they happen to stumble into.
Before adolescence, kids rely so heavily on our evaluation of who they are that they don’t develop strong self-assessment skills. As their pack changes from family to peer groups, they begin to see themselves through their peer’s eyes. It’s no wonder they’re so confused over their own identity. What’s worse, by relinquishing guardianship of their self-worth to others, they place their self-esteems in great peril.
Because of this, externally directed children are often afraid of failure. Think about it. Failure only frightens those who take humiliation, criticism, rejection and ridicule to heart. Externally directed kids do, because they rely so heavily on peer evaluation. And once they become failure phobic, they steer clear of positive risks that might wind up in defeat, like learning new skills, establishing new relationships, exploring unknowns, and undertaking new adventures. These children become highly dependent on others and are, for the most part, incompetent in the practical skills of life. Many adolescents today have no idea how to boil an egg or sort laundry. (Heck, by the looks of my husband’s shirts, I don’t think our housekeeper’s got that one licked either.) It’s no wonder underachievement and poor self-esteems are more commonplace now.
Since externally directed children have such weak inner compasses, their inner dishonesty can easily override it. This makes it very difficult for them to stop themselves from making the poor choices that their urges can produce. So the threshold to immoral behavior plummets, along with their sense of accountability and responsibility.
The result of all this—relative morality. The death of moral absolutes. Widening norms for behavior. Realities and expectations formed by external forces rather than our own minds. Today, the world is teeming with people who betray their own morals because they think like they won’t be caught, because everyone else is doing it or because there’s something in it for them. And oh, what a mess we have, then!
This pathologic allegiance to brands is only one symptom of the external direction eroding the moral backbone of our society. I believe this misguided choice-making style is the cause of most, if not all of the problems we face in the world today: body image and eating disorders, gangs and cults, substance and alcohol abuse, rampant materialism, the overbloated sense of entitlement, violence and other crimes, racism and so on.
But by identifying the source, the solution becomes obvious—the problems so easy to fix. Throughout the ages, we’ve been tackling each social problem one on one. We install metal detectors in the high schools. We establish new anti-bullying programs. We “declare war” on drug traffickers. But when we approach problems in this way, all we’re really doing is pruning the branches on this sick—dying—tree of social troubles. We need to look to the roots, not the branches to cure that tree. By raising children to become self-directed, that tree will flourish and those problems will either fade or disappear altogether.
Once self-directed our kids will not only possess all the qualities we could ever hope them to have, they’ll be able to recognize and control everything that tries to influence their choices. This is a life-long skill that will empower them to handle any choice they face in the future. When they learn how to choose instead of what to choose, our children will be the masters of their own lives. They’ll become the players, not the pawns, in the chess game of life. To that end, we will all be a part of raising the first generation of children who are truly responsible for making the world a better place.