Happy Saturday, everyone.

I want to use this showcase to write a few words on a little-known activist who almost succeeded in fundamentally changing the landscape of American consumerism. Peggy Charren was a self-described Boston-area ‘housewife’ who once described herself as “the most unsuccessful children’s advocate in history.” Though her self-deprecation was perhaps a bit exaggerated, Charren founded and led the Action for Children’s Television organization-- a non-profit activist group that sought to improve the quality of children’s programming. Her story is remarkable for a few reasons, but none more so than the fact that she was nearly-- so, so nearly-- successful in lobbying the federal government to ban all television advertisements targeting children. By the end of 1979, the FTC was one step away from affirming the work of Charren and changing the television landscape and American capitalism in an unprecedented way. Yet, just a few years later, children’s toy sales exploded, and advertising dominated kid’s shows during commercial breaks and through the shows themselves. The Reagan administration actualized the deregulatory zeitgeist that hoped to carry Americans out of the dreaded ‘stagflation’ of the 1970s. And while deregulation's effects on economic growth are still hotly debated, it is clear that the deregulation of television advertising ushered in a new age of American childhood consumers.

Charren’s journey began in the early 1960s when she would stand in the back of her living room on Saturday mornings and study what types of television shows her children were watching. At this point, American children watched anywhere from 5-7 hours of TV daily, with Saturdays as the cornerstone of their media diets. Charren was unsettled by what she saw. The content was one thing, and she readily admitted that a greater variety of educational programming was necessary. To Charren, the real issue with children’s television was the overcommercialization of childhood and a concerted effort by advertisers to ‘educate’ children young and shape lifelong consumers. Charren found other mothers that were equally concerned with what their kids were watching, and thus Action for Children’s Television (ACT) began in her kitchen.

Throughout the 1970s, Charren and ACT made progress in raising awareness about their goals. Initially, they petitioned the FCC with three goals. First, they wanted the FCC to rule if advertising to children was a deceptive practice. If so, everything else was moot, and the federal government should ban all television advertising to children under eight. Deception in advertising is still a hotly debated topic, though it must be situated within its historical context informed by the technology and research at the time. Simply, deception was understood as manipulating children’s imaginations to sell toys and sugary foods. Over 85% of television commercials aired to children sold these types of products, often using techniques that were not fully honest nor entirely accurate in their pitch. Further, advertisers researched children’s cognitive abilities to find better ways to keep their attention. This question of deception remained the central issue throughout ACT’s existence

The second demand was more immediate: banning “host selling” during children’s shows. Host selling describes a practice in which television hosts-- either human beings, puppets, or cartoons-- would advertise products during a show. This increased the number of times children were exposed to ads and blurred the line between entertainment and commerce. Various research (reach out to me if you want specific articles) indicated that the younger a child was, the less they understood the purpose or medium of “advertising” compared to entertainment. To Charren, this was a clear-cut example of deception and required an immediate ban.

Finally, Charren’s 1971 petition urged the FCC to require a minimum of 14 hours of educational programming funded by advertisers. Broadcasting licensing is a whole other topic that I do not want to dive too deeply into this, but ACT argued that if networks were going to use federal infrastructure (in this case, federally regulated broadcasting technology), then they should be forced to serve the public good by funding educational programming. For more information on this, see Jennifer Holt’s Empires of Entertainment: Media Industries and the Politics of Deregulation, 1980-1996.

ACT’s initial success was nothing short of astounding. They quickly became part of the national conversation, and Charren had embedded herself in the world of corporatism and politics. Starting in 1977, she hosted an annual gala that awarded networks that exemplified excellent children’s television standards, which meant an abundance of educational programming and a lack of advertising. As one media outlet said, “when ACT speaks, networks listen.”

Charren had an uncanny ability to serve as an excellent communicator, sitting through interview after interview and garnering national interest in her organization. She was also a savvy legal activist who consistently pressured both the FCC and FTC by bringing cases of deceptive advertising practices. An early win was against Hudson Pharmaceuticals Corp. and their promotion of “Spider-Man Vitamins.” These vitamins were marketed as healthy supplements that would round out any child’s diet, and they even came with a toy or ring for each purpose. ACT challenged this pitch, as the vitamins were filled with sugar, had unclear health benefits, and utilized a beloved superhero that urged children to beg their parents for this product. ACT argued these were deceptive practices, as many young children could not differentiate between the advertiser’s Spiderman and the real superhero they found in their comics. The FTC ruled in favor of ACT, and Hudson Pharmaceutical could no longer advertise their products before 9:05, nor could they use a character for marketing their vitamins. The FTC argued that “children are unqualified by age or experience to decide for themselves whether or not they need or should use multiple vitamin supplements in general or an advertised brand in particular. Thus, the directing of advertising of multiple vitamin supplements to children is in itself an unfair practice.”

By the end of the 1970s, ACT was on the offensive. Their goals broadened as they now sought to ban all advertising to children under eight, cease all advertising of sugary and unhealthy foods to children between 8 and 12, and order a massive corrective advertising campaign funded by broadcasters to undo the previous two decades of deceptive practices. The FCC seemed poised to accept these provisions, which would have been among the most sweeping regulation in the history of American Capitalism. Yet, by 1980, nothing had changed. Ronald Reagan’s election brought ACT’s efforts to a total halt. Not only did it reverse many of the gains ACT had made throughout the 1970s, but it deregulated provisions that existed prior to ACT’s existence, opening the floodgates for networks and advertisers to colonize children’s minds with a litany of new products.

This is getting longer than I expected, and I didn’t touch on everything I had hoped. Perhaps I will pick up next Saturday unless we suddenly start getting questions about deregulation and late-20th-century advertising. A riveting topic indeed!