In the 1964 Johnny seven OMA toy gun commercial, …show more content…
The commercial conveys this message by the way it starts out with a group of children having fun playing with toy guns, and then it cuts to a lone child playing with the advertised gun labeled as a ‘one man army’. The child is playing by himself with the one OMA gun and ‘defeats’ the enemy by himself. This could imply that the advertisers are trying to transfer the message to children who don’t have any siblings to play with, that they can have fun alone with this toy. Consequently, parents can view this as a toy that doesn’t require multiple players so their children wouldn’t be begging them to let their friends come …show more content…
The use of the way the boys are involved playing with the gun, in a real life scenario where they are fighting in a battle, implies that boys are supposed to grow up and get jobs where they will be using weapons and fighting such as joining the army or going into a law enforcement career. Since the commercial was made in 1964, a time during the Vietnam war, advertising weapons to young boys could be seen as a way the media is trying to influence children to grow up and live their life in a certain way, in this case boys growing up and fighting in the Vietnam