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Unethical Advertising

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Advertising to children should not be considered unethical or be deemed related to childhood obesity as there are many factors that play into obesity that are being denied or overlooked if the blame is put on advertising. Often, advertising is merely used as the scapegoat. Further, the primary intent of advertising food is to increase brand awareness; not to increase consumption. As defined by the Merriam Webster Dictionary, advertising is “the action of calling something to the attention of the public,” its purpose is not to force individuals to perform an action, rather just make their product/service more known (“Advertising”). According to Kant’s Duty-Based Ethics, since the intent of advertising is not to increase obesity in the consumers’, it cannot be deemed unethical. Overall, research shows that most children under the age of 6 cannot distinguish between programming and advertising; therefore, this further attests to advertising not being harmful to kids and their health. In general, excess weight gain in young people is similar to those in adults, including factors such as a person’s behavior and genetics. Therefore, there should not be a focus on advertising to kids alone; if there needs to be more regulations with advertising in terms of advertising to kids, then regulations should be made in advertising to adults as well.
Obesity is considered a disease that is derived from having too much body fat. The extra weight can be from bone, muscle, fat, and/or body water (Obesity: Medline). In any case, the disease is present when the weight of the person is greater than what's considered healthy for his or her height. Although advertising food to kids may contribute to the rate of obesity in America, it is proven that it is not the only factor and certainly is not the most prominent. There are a number of other factors that can contribute to obesity in an individual.
Obesity is a condition that some individuals may not have any control over as it may be caused by their genetic makeup. A countless number of studies have established that the different forms of obesity tend to be generated within a family. According to the Center of Research at the University of Laval, the risk of obesity is 2 to 8 times

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