Alcohol Ads
Your editorial “It Is a Two-Way Street” (July 23) makes a great point of the balance between individual and corporate responsibility. Individuals do have responsibility for how and when they drink, but unfortunately many of these decisions are made in the midst of lopsided media blitzes that depict alcohol consumption as the key to success and aggressively target people of color and women. Who can compete with the slick ads from the alcohol manufacturers? Not prevention folks or parents trying to give an evenhanded message to their children!
Surgeon General Antonia Novello is right to use her position as the nation’s doctor to call attention to these outrageous marketing practices.
“There oughta be a law,” but advertising regulation is unlikely because the alcohol industry uses its money to buy power and influence.
ANGELA GOLDBERG, Chair, Los Angeles County Alcohol Policy Coalition, Pasadena
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
