Irresponsible Advertising

Amber Alert it is Not

Commercial advertising for the general public should be responsible. It should not endanger children in the interest of promoting a product. Missing children is a real threat and children need to know how to be safe and how to avoid being kidnapped.

Verizon has a series of commercials on television for it's Fios product. The commercials seem to teach children how not to be safe. It promotes talking to strangers in cars on the sidewalk witout their parents. In such a situation even the parent should be wary and ask for identification. This however is not the case.

A very disturbing Verizon Vios commercial has been runing for the past several weeks on local tv stations in my area. The commercial shows a small child standing curbside alone with a stranger whose back door of a van is open supposedly from Verizon Vios. The adult engages the child in conversation dazzling him with his truck and information about the cable service.

What is so disturbing? Why would a child of arounf 5 years old be out alone on a suburban sidewalk talking to a stranger in a van? The child should not be on the curb, should not be talking to a stranger and could if the person was less than well meaning, be kidnapped and lost forever...

Today a follow up commercial was shown where the young boy has gone inside to speak to his unconcerned father who is reading a newspaper inside the house, totally dumbfounded and out of touch as the child rattles off the information about the service told by the stranger. The next scene, the child and father are outside watching the Verizon man running wires to a box and the boy tells the father, "you should see his truck". The man does not show any ID to identify himself as the Verizon Rep.

These commercials show a parent who has no control or concern for the child who can wander in and out of the house at will and a child with no training to beware of strangers. A 5 year old or similar age is too young to be unsupervised. Young children, teens and even older folks, have been taken into vehicles against their will and have been kidnapped, raped and killed.