The Stepford Kids

If it has been a few decades since you've visited an American public school, you'd probably be shocked to see how much some of these once-sacred temples of learning now have in common with the mall. The walls of many sports stadiums are smothered in corporate logos. Most lunchrooms could double as fast-food courts. And classroom TV monitors flash a regular stream of racy video-game, movie, and fast-food ads along with the TV news shows that get piped to 40% of U.S. teens. Corporations have even made "huge inroads" in the curriculum, thanks to the free materials they send to schools says Boston College sociologist Juliet B. Schor. Among the things grade-schoolers have been taught: that fossil fuels may pose few environmental problems and that alternative energy is costly and unattainable, in the words of Exxon's Energy Cube curriculum. They've also learned that the "earth could benefit rather than be harmed from increased carbon dioxide" from materials provided by the American Coal Foundation.

These are just a few of the many reasons why Schor believes that Corporate America has succeeded in a frightening, Stepford Wives-like takeover of tween consciousness. In her artfully argued, important exposé, Born To Buy: The Commercialized Child and the New Consumer Culture, Schor draws on interviews with marketers, academic research, and her own survey of Massachusetts fifth- and sixth-graders. Her chief villains: "predatory" marketers who go so far as to pay parents and schools to get access to kids. Because kids have gotten so skeptical, companies have countered with more craftiness. They hire cool alpha boys to flack products to their pals. They find "It" girls to host slumber parties and then ply their friends with products.