I don’t know what Sundays are like at your house, but at my house there’s a lot of football watching. This past Sunday was no different. After I brought my daughter Freckles home from cheerleading (believe me, it’s absurd that I’m the squad’s coach), I made sure to catch some of the Patriots-Cowboys game with my husband and my son, Tank. Tank is 7½.
You know what I noticed? During football games, there are a ridiculous number of commercials for drugs to treat erectile dysfunction.
In between Tom Brady touchdown passes, which make me really happy because I grew up outside of Boston in the days when the Patriots were known as “the hapless Pats,” the networks sandwich in commercial after commercial for Levitra, Viagra, and Cialis, which make me really unhappy. Really unhappy. And they don’t quite sail over Tank’s head. My husband told me that, despite not knowing what erectile dysfunction really is or maybe because he didn’t know, Tank once asked him if he takes Levitra. (For the record, he does not.)
Believe me, I’m sympathetic to people with medical conditions, but is 4:00 pm on a Sunday afternoon the time to advertise E.D. medications? And Tank gets up early in the morning to watch ESPN. That network’s loaded with the same ads at all hours.
You’ve seen the ones for depression, restless leg syndrome, high cholesterol, insomnia, acid reflux… The list goes on and on. And I know they’re legal and all these drugs benefit the people who need them, but there are simply too many commercials for prescription medications on television. Maybe there shouldn’t be any.
To me, all this direct-to-consumer prescription advertising muddies the message about drugs at best, and at worst, starts us down a dangerous path to thinking drugs are always the answer. That’s what I think. You?
Give me an E! Give me a D! (Getty Images)
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I totally agree with you about the drug advertising, on a lot of levels. The advertising of ED meds is not going over our kids heads, and unfortunately its not limited to television. My husband was at a Patriots game a few years ago, and said there was a person dressed up as a Levitra tablet on the field during 1/2 time. I work in a pharmacy, and I have noticed how many people feel that a pill will cure everything. Some patients actualy get annoyed if the doctor won’t write a prescription for them. As parents my husband and I talk with our daughter about drugs - both prescription and street drugs. Especially emphasizing that even if a medication is legal, doesn’t mean its always ok to take.
I do agree with you. I really do. I’m on this site for a health project I’m working on. A.K.A, I’m not out of middle school yet. I am a few years older than your son, so named “Tank”. I do feel though, because of what I have read in countless other viewpoints of my age group, that boys have a harder time talking to their mom’s rather than their dad’s. That if your son talks to your husband about something that he doesnt know about whoever parent he asked should answer the question. I know your not supposed to say anything to your kids without the other opinion of your partner, but hey I’m talking with a 14 yearold impression here. I dont even know what E.D means. I look at the first word and relate it to what guys do when they’re……for a lack of a better word, ‘excited’ but other than that I dont know. Instead of asking my dad, I’d ask my mom, if I ever found out my mom told my dad about that, sorry for my ‘french’, I’d be ticked off.
Its not a conversation I want my dad to know I had.
Anyways, yes drugs are advertised on the channels children watch. But they’re more menacing at school. Highschool is where it supposedly hits you the worst. But there are drugs in my junior high, kids are going around with who knows what in their backpacks. I heard the quote, “It’s like swearing, you start, you can’t stop. You try and limit it, you only say it when it really hurts.”
I barely caught myself when I was around my little cousins. Instead of saying the “s” word I twisted it and said, “Oh Shitake Mushrooms” I was so close on blurting the real word out. Then I spent to whole evening explaining to my third youngest cousin what Shitake Mushrooms are.
I dont even know what they are.
I said their a japanese mushroom dipped in some sauce.
Point is. No matter what age, nature and personal center, every teen is going to go through drug dealing. Heck I am a 14 year old, goth girl, who likes loud metal/rock/’emo’ music, hangs out in back of class, never talks or talks really soft, is always called emo when she isnt and has drama circuling around her head…Everyday.
Drugs….To teens. A way to escape.
To me. They’re just another stupid sucide attempt in junior high.
~SANTI~
note
I am not emo. Or cutter. Or a druggie. I simply live and act the way I love being. I am me. Let me be me. A goth girl, who listens to loud music.
Woop- Di Doo