Following the recent launch of a New York Metropolitan Transit Authority campaign for a Queens-based plastic surgeon, Howard Glaser, an aide to New York Governor Cuomo issued a stern letter to the MTA urging the authority to revisit its advertising standards.
In the letter, Glaser wrote, “Tens of thousands of children ride the transit system every day to go to school. The MTA is a public conveyance, subsidized by $190 million annually in the state budget, plus over $5 billion in dedicated taxes. The public has a right to expect that the MTA will strive for a family-friendly environment.”
The MTA initially defended the ads then back peddled. On Tuesday, MTA spokesman Adam Lisberg said, “The MTA understands the concerns that Governor Cuomo and other parents have raised about this advertisement and about maintaining a family-friendly environment on our trains and buses. We will revisit our standards for advertisements and our process for reviewing them.”
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with boob jobs or cleavage, but Glaser does have a point. Do children really need to be subjected to the sort of suggestion that they are somehow inferior if they don’t have bulging cleavage like the woman in these ads? Kids have enough to deal with. There’s no need to add to the pile.
