Letting Children be Children
15.
The landlords of retail space, notably shopping mall owners, can also consider acting on customer complaints, and we are aware of one example of a shopping mall which insisted that a retailer change their window display as a result of customer complaints. However, we doubt that many parents would be aware of this as a possible avenue of complaint.
Print media
16.
In terms of print media, as set out in Theme 1, the use of sexualised pictures on the front page or cover of tabloid newspapers and magazines (for example, the so—called 'lads' mags') has raised concerns. Some parents are also concerned about the pictures of models or celebrities that fuel anxieties in children about their bodies, that is, that they do not conform to some arbitrary standard of beauty.
"With girls I think she sees the celebrities and she associates them with perfect... think that's how she's got to look. She's only 7 and she'll talk about someone being pretty and thin, and that's directly because of the magazines."
Parent, Review qualitative research
17.
Although, as a recent report for Demos (Darlington et al, 2011) points out, there is no clear evidence of a causal link between such images and harm to young people, it is clear that both parents and young people who contributed to the Review see such magazine coverage as contributing to issues such as low self—esteem and self—image. A number of the young people's and women's organisations who contributed to the Review also shared this view. Currently the only avenue of complaint on these issues is to the magazine itself or the retailer as this is not covered by the regulatory system for print media.The public campaigns currently running on both magazine display and airbrushing should help raise awareness of these issues. For example, Girlguiding UK's petition calling for labelling to distinguish between airbrushed and natural images received over 25,000 signatures.
"When I was eleven I read a teenage magazine for the first time and that's when it kind of clicked, 'I should be like this '.
Young person (Girlguiding UK, 2008)
18.
In terms of the editorial content of the print media, parents contributing to the Review reported very little concern although there were a few comments made about the age-appropriateness of the content of some teenage magazines. The main regulatory body for the print media, the Press Complaints Commission, is responsible for complaints on the editorial content of newspapers, magazines and their websites but its remit expressly excludes matters of taste and decency (Press Complaints Commission,
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