Dr. Paul Folkemer, Take Down This Ad!

September 10, 2008

 

 

There’s a new movie coming out in October.

From the Motion Picture Association of America website:

 

This movie has teen drinking – a LOT of it (we’ve seen the trailer), sexual content, vulgar language, and other offensive content. To give you an idea of this movie: The main male character plays in a band called "The Jerk Offs." The sound check before they begin playing is "F***!, S***!, C***!"

The characters in this movie are TEENS not college students. No one is over 21, but drinking is totally normalized for minors.

The message from this movie: Virtually ALL teenagers drink alcohol.

This is a "funny" scene where a teenage boy is carrying a drunk girl away from a party.

 

 

And of course Channel One News is advertising this movie to children.

 

Channel One is not only advertising this age-inappropriate movie but they are running the contest you see above. They are dangling prizes in front of kids to get them excited about this age-inappropriate movie. The contest is featured on the homepage of channelone.com so no child can miss it.

The man allowing this to happen is Dr. Paul Folkemer the VP of Education at Channel One. He is the self-proclaimed "child advocate" at the company (as if no other employee cares about children). The fact that he is approving this commercial for all ages of kids (any child who visits channelone.com sees this ad) is bad enough, but when you consider that Dr. Folkemer is the CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD for MADD – as in Mothers Against Drunk Driving – it makes his actions even more detestable.

Obligation’s Jim Metrock said, "Dr. Folkemer needs to make an important personal decision. Either he is going to financially benefit from advertising entertainment that encourages teens to drink alcohol and behave recklessly or he is going to speak up and stop Channel One News from advertising this type of rot. Columbia Pictures is paying Channel One News to pitch this movie to kids. This movie studio knows that up to six million students down to age ten are compelled to watch the in-school TV show and that they are told constantly to visit Channel One’s website. Dr. Folkemer and all the other remaining employees at Channel One will see their share of that ad revenue in their paycheck. Money that comes from advertising a movie that normalizes teen drinking to a captive audience of impressionable young people is almost literally blood money. As the Chairman of the Board for MADD, Channel One’s Dr. Folkemer has to decide if he is going to exacerbate the teen drinking problem or is he going to try to mitigate it.

"I have sent an email to Dr. Folkemer pleading with him to remove all advertising for this movie. If he replies, I will post his response."