When the Tories killed the previous government's plans to build a massive database to monitor anti-social behaviour and adult-child interaction basically from birth, it seemed like the UK was finally stepping back from the Nanny State brink.
But it turns out they just want to privatise it. A new Cameron government report calls for voluntary, industry-led kerbs on "the commercialisation of childhood," including putting age controls on TV, video games, music, and the Internet. And clothing, don't forget the slutty clothing.
The report, gets its title, "Let children be children," from a similar campaign against oversexualized tween fashion launched by Mumsnet called, "Let girls be girls."
[Mumsnet] will announce a new code next week. It is expected to advise retailers against suggestive or gender-specific slogans on clothes, black or enhanced bras, and will propose modest swimwear for pre-teens.The Cameron report also calls for more attention to be paid to parental complaints, which will no doubt please the owners and mobilizers of large online audiences of overly concerned mums--as well as the Daily Mail, which instigated a campaign against ITV in April over prime time performances by Rihanna and Christina Aguilera. [Regulators dismissed the complaints, ruling that the Rihanna's "gentle thrusting of the buttocks" was, in fact, not harmful for younger viewers. Here's the clip, you can decide for yourself. It really is the little differences, I guess.
Cameron-backed report to protect children from commercialisation [guardian via dan]
