When my five-year old daughter Grace was admitted to Children's Hospital Los Angeles last week, she looked out the one window in her room and saw the billboard for the "Poltergeist" movie. "That clown is very scary," she said. The nurse who was taking her vitals looked out and said, "Grace, you've solved the mystery. The three year-old next door has been crying and keeps asking us to make the scary clown go away, but we didn't know what she was talking about." The nurse rushed to the next room and closed the little girl's blinds so that the "scary clown" would finally stop haunting her.

I was angry. As a mom of a cancer child, it's not fair that kids fighting for their lives should be afraid of imaginary clowns too. It was irresponsible advertising. I took a photo of my daughter in her hospital bed with the clown glaring in from outside. I posted it on Facebook and sent out the billboard owner's phone number and asked that everyone call and ask them to remove the scary clown.

Amazingly, the next morning the clown was gone. An executive at FOX, who distributes the movie "Poltergeist," heard our story and had arranged to have the billboard removed, in the middle of the night in a thunderstorm.We are so grateful to FOX, they made things right for the kids staying at the hospital...but the clown remains up all over town on other billboards.

He's on mall signs next to children's play areas. He's on bus stops as kids wait to go to school. I've heard from many other moms that this clown is scaring their children so much that they have to take different routes because of the clown on billboards near their parks and schools. Young children can't separate fantasy from fact, so outdoor advertisements like the scary clown are as real as the real thing to a kid. 

The movie industry is not sufficient at self policing their print advertising. And there is no authority approving these ads to make sure they're age-appropriate for where they're shown.

If the American Picture Association of America makes ratings for movie previews (to rate a film's suitability for certain audiences, based on its content, such as the G, PG, PG-13 and R ratings) because they believe movie previews need to be age-appropriate, why are they not addressing outdoor print media as well?

The American Picture Association of America needs to have ratings for outdoor print media and advertising. They already help us keep movies and previews age-appropriate. They need to keep outdoor advertising age-appropriate too. 

Please help me ask The American Picture Association of America to get more involved with all forms of movie advertising that are viewed by the general public. We don't want inappropriate outdoor advertising making the world scary for our children.

KCAL9 Los Angles did an interview with Grace about the "scary clown": 

http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/video/11523989-mother-of-5-year-old-with-cancer-gets-billboard-near-hospital-with-very-scary-image-removed/

You can also read the original post on Facebook here:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/TeamGraceEllen/