Giving children the message that they are what they own, rather than being valued for who they are, can negatively affect their wellbeing. Nearly three-fifths of parents believe that advertising seen by children can be harmful to them. Using sex to sell to children is particularly objectionable and 80% of parents are concerned about the impact of sexualised content in television, films, magazines and the internet on their children.

Our Bye Buy Childhood campaign aims to empower families to challenge the commercialisation and sexualisation of childhood through positive action.

Join our campaign to say “bye bye” to buying childhood.

Mothers’ Union has launched this campaign in Britain and Republic of Ireland to:

• Challenge children, their parents or guardians and wider family to think about their consumer habits
• Empower families to address the influence of commercialisation within the home
• Engage with the commercial world and take positive action to challenge instances of inappropriate marketing or selling
• Hold the UK Government accountable on the pledges made in the coalition’s Programme for Government to
  1. address the commercialisation and sexualisation of children; and
  2. raise awareness amongst other political representatives across the UK and Ireland.

OUT NOW!

Labelled for Life: Managing the commercial world as a family

Labelled for Life: Managing the commercial world as a family is a new booklet from the Bye Buy Childhood campaign to help you tackle the commercialisation of childhood. It outlines how marketing targets children and offers tried and tested ideas from Mothers’ Union members in navigating this world, to help children be happy, healthy and commercially confident. This accessible, full-colour, A5 booklet is available from Mothers’ Union for £2 per copy. Contact us on 020 7222 5533; at Mary Sumner House, 24 Tufton Street, London SW1P 3RB; by emailing us at mu@themothersunion.org, or you can download our order form Labelled for Life Order Form

The ParentPort website was launched in June 2011 in response to recommendations from the Bailey Review and is run by UK media regulators. The website offers parents, carers and anyone else a way of making an official complaint to regulators about material they may find inappropriate for children. It covers the range of media advertising from TV and radio, print media and outdoor advertising to online advertising; as well as information and links to regulator guidelines.

Please help us to raise awareness of this website.