Australia & Random 27 Feb 2007 10:07 am
On kids and cars
Sometimes I think that the best argument against having kids is the behaviour of some parents. I mean, it does look like having kids turns you into a raving lunatic — at least for some people. Case in point: an ad for Hyundai was pulled from Australia TV after stations received complaints from parents. The ad shows a very young kid (two, maybe three years old) driving a Hyundai SUV, picking up a girl of the same age on the side of the road and going to the beach to surf.
The parents complained because, among other things, the ad — get this! — promotes under-age driving. Now, I can’t imagine that a 12 or 13-year-old, who might be physically able to actually drive a car, will be compelled to do so after seeing a toddler driving on TV. And a toddler just won’t be able to drive! Not that a toddler will fell inclined to do so, anyway.
Now, to be fair, part of the problem, supposedly, is that the kid is shown wearing a seat-belt, instead of the obligatory child-restraint seat (well, duh! how would he be able to drive from the child seat?) and that contravenes the advertising rules for cars. But it’s a two-year-old driving! How much less real can you get?
The ad is still running in New Zealand, apparently. And, of course, it’s in YouTube (that’s the NZ version; the Australian one was identical except for the URL, the voice-over and the sign the girl was holding — it read “the beach” here). And, as far as I know, no one complained about a toddler going into the sea unsupervised.
P.S.: SWMBO thinks that the parents who complained might have a point, as a slightly older kid (say, 5 or 6) might be encouraged to at least ask his parents for a chance of driving after seeing a toddler doing so; I remain unconvinced.
P.P.S.: then again… Toddler driver pins mum to wall
