Booze ad ban no cure for hangover
NEWSWATCH: Bizcommunity.com's very own Chris Moerdyk, writing in Business Day, takes issue with the government's proposed ban on alcohol advertising and reckons that based on overseas research, any ban is bound to fail. Meanwhile, Sanef is objecting to a call by MPs to have the profession legally defined, reports Times Live.
For more:
- Business Day: Banning booze ads won't cure South Africa's drinking problem... Where have you ever seen any advertisement in any media extolling the pleasures of cocaine, heroin or any other illegal drug? Where have you seen any advertisement extolling the virtues of child abuse? Exactly, none!
Yet we have a massive drug problem in SA, and a massive problem with child abuse. Yet neither is promoted through advertising, so one conclusion one might be able to reasonably draw from that is that advertising per se is not the be-all-and-end-all of the issue and banning a particular genre of advertising is unlikely to be a panacea in the fight against a social problem.
Chris Moerdyk is dead right... Banning alcohol advertising is highly unlikely to curb alcohol abuse in this country to any great extent so perhaps health minister Aaron Motsoaledi needs to have a rethink on the proposed ban.
- Times Live: You don't license a free press: Sanef... Sanef has rejected a call by MPs that the profession be legally defined. After all, Sanef argues, a journalist can be taken off a register just as he or she was put on it - with potentially dire consequences for his or her career.