The price of advertising

_{So another young man goes berserk in the US and massacres innocent people just because his life was not as he expected it to be.}

_{The front page of the Metro last week had a story of a 20 year old young man who took his own life because he could not get a job. The young man in America had no such problem. In fact it appears money was no problem, but it could not buy him what he wanted. It could not procure for him all the adverts told him it could. We now hear how he was taking body building supplements to enhance his body as he obviously thought if he was a well built young man his dreams would come true. Isn’t this what the advertisements show you? The man walking down the beach with his well toned, bronzed body being adored by all the beautiful young women in all that sun, white sand and sea breeze.}

_{I have said previously how I wanted to enter a tanning studio which portrayed a life size Pamela Anderson in Baywatch, surf board under her arm, blond hair blowing in the breeze, plastered all over the entrance window enticing me in. Now I am long enough in the tooth to know no amount of pummeling, bronzing, hair growing or dieting could change me into Pamela Anderson, but the young are filled with hope and dreams. They are persuaded, you can be anything you wish if you work hard enough at it and give us loads of money. So we have young people who must have designer clothes, so they look like their heroes. We have young men who will buy body building supplements to make their body bigger and beefier; you have young girls becoming bulimic or anorexic because they hate their bodies; you have people going under the surgeon’s knife to give them the body they think they are entitled to have because they have the money to pay for the operation.}

_{Stop and think of what advertising is doing to our young people. These young people need advice; they need someone to talk to instead of being immersed in the internet or the television which spends all its time talking money and desires. These young people need to find their individuality and not be afraid to be themselves. They need to see why they are being persuaded they need to be better, they need to have a certain body shape and they need to have a man or woman on their arm to be complete. Each person is an individual and it is up to us to show them the way to a happy and fulfilled life by not getting caught up in the chasing the rainbow culture which is there to take money from them and nothing more. What a hollow existence is the world of illusion.}

_{The only downside is my grandson has decided he is never going to iron his clothes again. Because he has worked the reason we iron clothes out for himself. We are persuaded that our clothes should be flat and uncreased just so commercialism can sell us expensive irons. His life has been made better in one stroke, he never has to iron and he sees through the system. Job done.}