Imagine that there is a bus shelter on the way to school with a big window for an advertisement.
Imagine that there is an advertisement put there recently featuring a deranged looking teenager, some policemen and a large headline stating ICE DESTROYS LIVES.
Would you, in the privacy of your mind, start to worry about this? Would you start to think, every time you passed it, about all the times you'd cheerfully put some water in a plastic container and put it in the freezer for a scientific experiment? It seemed all right at the time, putting lego in the water to see if you could make a lego ice cube but... but.. ICE DESTROYS LIVES. And would you wonder about all the times you'd just sucked on an ice cube? Would you start to wonder how many ice cubes you'd have had to suck before you ended up like the guy in the photo? Would you?Do you think, remembering you are only 8, and would never have had time to read the fine print, that you might eventually have to ask your parents in a small, worried voice What does that ad mean?
Mmm. So did Climber. And I think he was rather relieved when I explained it to him.
Oh dear, poor guy!
ReplyDeleteWhat does that say about me when I didn't even think about ice as frozen water. Happy the record was set straight for him, but I suspect it lead to even more questions
ReplyDeleteCindy, it took me a while to work it out too. He never mentioned his worries about playing with H20 ice (which he does a lot) he just asked more than once what does that ad mean?
ReplyDeletePoor Climber. It's kind of a disturbing image/ad for a kid to have to deal with.
ReplyDeleteAnd so the innocence begins to fade away.... ...if only there weren't such things that needed explanations. How precious, though, your Climber boy.
ReplyDeleteI've worried about small children seeing this ad myself, because it's really quite graphic isn't it. Poor Climber!
ReplyDeleteick ! Such a shame he is so bright - you have years of question answering ahead of you....
ReplyDelete(and just for fun,freeze a glove full of water draped over an orange. Remove orange and glove and turn over - a great weird frozen claw - or crazy salad dish...)
That is priceless! Poor Climber! I just had to explain pads to my 8 year old! Fun times!
ReplyDeleteSiobhan
Awwww. And isn't it sweet that he's too young to only know about the H20 kind? Those kinds of things worried me when I was little.
ReplyDeleteIt is a confusing world out there, when you are only 8.
ReplyDeleteThere are good things and bad things that come from this frame of mind of his.
ReplyDelete1. He will never forget his feelings when he thought they were referring to the H20 kind, and if he is ever offered the other stuff, he will remember, it destroys lives.
2. Ya just wanta give him a hug tho, don't you? If only we could protect them from the yukky stuff forever.
Billboard advertising and radio advertising( you know my views on that one). Way too much information for young children, and it's hard to stop them hearing/seeing it.
ReplyDeleteI hope he can rest now, knowing his own brand of ice is fine. (Although tell him not to crunch it with his teeth - it may not destroy lives, but it can destroy teeth.)
Now I'm with Climber on this one - obviously a drug that goes by another name here in the UK. Being a teacher you have to be pretty up on street drug names and if it's caled this in the UK, it's passed me by.
ReplyDeleteOh God.
ReplyDeleteThe poor little bugger.
Never crossed the stupid marketing manager's mind, that one, did it?
We're probably breeding a whole generation of kids secretly terrified of frozen water....
The ad at my tram stop just says "ice ruins lives", with a bleary=eyed banker looking chappie looking sad. Perhaps city office folk are more easily frightened than 8 year old boys.
ReplyDeleteSee I'm with Nic, must go by a different name here too, so while everyone in your neck of the woods is lamenting how upsetting it is, I have to say that I was immediately with Climber on this and literally laughing out loud in appreciation for where his poor mind was going. To the point that my husband was in the other room saying, " What is it? what's so funny."
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you cleared things up for him.
oh,
ReplyDeletegoodness :(
Poor Climber - that as is really scary :(
ad. that AD is really scary.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard work to be a sensitive boy who thinks deeply. Thank goodness you were there to make life make sense.
ReplyDeleteThat's one scary ass ad. I guess that is the point, though. It's not one easily forgotten and it did open a dialogue. I just hate that these dialogues are forced. We don't get a chance to be parents before our kids are hit with visuals that scare and if they grow surrounded by these images isn't there a chance that the images become normalized, and later, ignored?
ReplyDeleteGlad he asked and didn't just carry around fear.
see now before I saw the picture I thought it would be of a car crash, the car having skidded on a patch of black ice or something. But yes I can imagine the questions and I'm glad you managed to answer them
ReplyDeletePoor little guy! How stressful. Glad you were able to set him straight.
ReplyDeleteCrazy even having to explain this to an 8 year old. We have the same ad near us, I haven't had to explain yet, as the reading is still kicking in.
ReplyDelete