We have compiled the following list of organizations, books, and articles to provide you with resources to accompany the MEF film Consuming Kids. MEF does not necessarily endorse the organizations or resources we have listed here, nor do we endorse the information they provide or the contents of their websites or print materials. Links are checked and updated periodically.
Organizations
Action Coalition for Media Education is a global coalition run by and for media educators, whose mission is to democratize our media system through education and activism.
The Alliance for Childhood uses public education campaigns to promote policies and practices that support children’s healthy development, love of learning, and joy in living, therefore creating a more just, democratic, and ecologically responsible future.
The AACAP (American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry) is the leading national professional medical association dedicated to treating and improving the quality of life for children, adolescents, and families affected by youth mental, behavioral, or developmental disorders.
The American Academy of Pediatrics is an organization of 60,000 pediatricians committed to the attainment of optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents, and young adults.
ASCD is a membership organization that develops programs, products, and services essential to the way educators learn, teach, and lead.
California Project LEAN (Leaders Encouraging Activity and Nutrition) (CPL) is a joint program of the California Department of Health Services and the Public Health Institute focusing on youth empowerment, policy and environmental change strategies, and community-based solutions. CPL’s mission is to increase healthy eating and physical activity to reduce the prevalence of obesity and chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, osteoporosis, and diabetes.
Fair Play is the leading nonprofit organization committed to helping children thrive in an increasingly commercialized, screen-obsessed culture, and the only organization dedicated to ending marketing to children.
Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids acts to change public attitudes and public policies on tobacco in order to prevent kids from smoking, help smokers quit and protect everyone from secondhand smoke.
Canadians Concerned About Violence in Entertainment (C-CAVE) is an independent national non-profit public interest organization committed to increasing public awareness about the effects of cultural violence on society.
The Center for Informed Food Choices (CIFC) advocates for a diet based on whole, unprocessed, local, organically grown plant foods. CIFC believes that: placing these foods at the center of the plate is crucial for promoting public health, protecting the environment, and assuring the humane treatment of animals and food industry workers.
The Center for a New American Dream helps Americans consume responsibly to protect the environment, enhance quality of life, and promote social justice.
The Center on Media and Child Health conducts, coordinates and compiles scientific research to improve the understanding of how media affect children’s health in positive and negative ways and provides evidence-based expertise to initiatives and programs that address children’s involvement with media.
CSPI seeks to educate the public, advocate government policies that are consistent with scientific evidence on health and environmental issues, and counter industry’s powerful influence on public opinion and public policies.
Center for SCREEN-TIME Awareness provides information so people can live healthier lives in functional families in vibrant communities by taking control of the electronic media in their lives, not allowing it to control them.
Children Now is recognized as a leading national public policy organization working to ensure children have a healthy and diverse media environment.
The Children’s Society is a leading national charity, driven by the belief that every child deserves a good childhood. The Children’s Society provides help and understanding for those forgotten children who are unable to find the support they need anywhere else.
The Citizens’ Campaign for Commercial-Free Schools (CCCS) is a statewide grassroots, nonprofit organization based in Seattle, Washington, whose mission is to protect the right of Washington children and youth to a commercial-free education.
Commercial Alert’s mission is to keep the commercial culture within its proper sphere, and to prevent it from exploiting children and subverting the higher values of family, community, environmental integrity and democracy.
The Education and the Public Interest Center (EPIC) at the University of Colorado at Boulder partners with the Education Policy Research Unit (EPRU) and the Commercialism in Education Research Unit (CERU) at Arizona State University to produce policy briefs and think tank reviews. These centers provide a variety of audiences, both academic and public, with information, analysis, and insight to further democratic deliberation regarding educational policies.
Common Sense Media is dedicated to improving the media and entertainment lives of kids and families by providing trustworthy information and tools, as well as an independent forum, so that families can have a choice and a voice about the media they consume.
CEASE is a network of parents, teachers and other concerned individuals who are dedicated to creating a safe world for our children. We seek to end the violence that permeates our society to an ever increasing degree and to remove the root causes of this violence by advocating for peace, justice, and economic opportunity.
Industry Ears is a new generation nonpartisan think tank aimed at addressing and finding solutions to disparities in media that negatively impact individuals and communities.
The Kaiser Family Foundation is a non-profit, private operating foundation focusing on the major health care issues facing the U.S., with a growing role in global health. Unlike grant-making foundations, Kaiser develops and runs its own research and communications programs, sometimes in partnership with other non-profit research organizations or major media companies. Kaiser serves as a non-partisan source of facts, information, and analysis for policymakers, the media, the health care community, and the public.
Kids Can Make a Difference, an educational program for middle- and high school students, focuses on the root causes of hunger and poverty, the people most affected, solutions, and how students can help. Their major goal is to stimulate the students to take some definite follow-up actions as they begin to realize that one person can make a difference.
The Lion & Lamb Project aims to stop the marketing of violence to children by helping parents, industry and government officials recognize that violence is not child’s play, and by galvanizing concerned adults to take action.
MNet is a Canadian non-profit organization that promotes media and Internet education by producing online programs and resources, working in partnership with Canadian and international organizations, and speaking to audiences across Canada and around the world.
The Motherhood Project seeks to help mothers meet the unprecedented challenges of mothering in the 21st century. They seek to promote a mothers’ renaissance — fresh thinking, discussion, and activism by mothers about motherhood and mothering — and to explore mothers’ potential as catalysts for cultural and social transformation.
The National Institute on Media and the Family is a nonprofit, national resource center for research, information, and education about the impact of the media on children and families. The Institute seeks to educate and inform the public, and to encourage practices and policies that promote positive change in the production and use of mass media.
The New Mexico Media Literacy Project is one of the largest and most successful media literacy organizations in the United States. Their mission is to cultivate critical thinking and activism in our media culture to build healthy and just communities.
New Moon Girl Media is the leader in products that help girls reach their full potential. Maker of girl-created, advertising-free communities where girls learn to recognize and resist gender stereotypes, New Moon Girl Media serves girls ages 8 to 15 and brings their voices to the world.
Obligation seeks to empower citizens with the resources they need to protect children from the popular culture and to remind businesses and governments of their responsibility to children.
The Praxis Project is a national, nonprofit organization that builds partnerships with local groups to influence policymaking to address the underlying, systemic causes of community problems. Committed to closing the health gap facing communities of color, The Praxis Projects forges alliances for building healthy communities.
Stay Free! is a nonprofit, Brooklyn-based magazine that explores the politics and perversions of mass media and American consumer culture.
TRUCE is an organization of early childhood professionals that works to promote a positive play environment for children. They share a concern about how children’s entertainment and toys affect behavior and learning.
ZERO TO THREE is a national nonprofit organization that informs, trains and supports professionals, policymakers and parents in their efforts to improve the lives of infants and toddlers.
Books
Buy, Buy, Baby: How Consumer Culture Manipulates Parents and Harms Young Minds | Susan Gregory Thomas
Come on People: On the Path from Victims to Victors | Bill Cosby, Alvin F. Poussaint
Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health (California Studies in Food and Culture, 3) | Marion Nestle
The Hurried Child: Growing Up Too Fast Too Soon | David Elkind
Kidfluence: Why Kids Today Mean Business | Ann Sutherland & Beth Thompson
Kidnapped: How Irresponsible Marketers are Stealing the Minds of Your Children | Daniel Acuff & Robert Reiher
The Other Parent: The Inside Story of the Media’s Effect on Our Children | James P. Steyer
Packaging Girlhood: Rescuing Our Daughter’s from Marketer’s Schemes | Sharon Lamb & Lyn Mikel Brown
Selling Out America’s Children: How America Puts Profits Before Values and What Parents Can Do | David Walsh
So Sexy So Soon : The New Sexualized Childhood and What Parents Can Do to Protect Their Kids | Jean Kilbourne & Diane Levin
Taking Back Childhood : Helping Your Kids Thrive in a Fast-Paced, Media-Saturated, Violence-Filled World | Nancy Carlsson-Paige
Toxic Childhood: How the Modern World is Damaging Our Children and What We Can Do About It | Sue Palmer
Youth in a Suspect Society: Democracy or Disposability? | Henry Giroux
