The gendering was really obscene on this one in particular. Bright pink... "Housekeeping" in big letters... "Toys" in tiny ones. Since, you know, the toy eventually becomes the reality. For people with vaginas (only). Which are pink inside.FLAIL.
The colored gendering of all the "girls" aisles really pisses me off, even beyond the crappy gendering of which toys were on them/which toys girls are allowed or supposed to want. I know people discuss this time and time again, but why do we insist on marking the stuff for "girls" so that boys know not to go near -- even before they get close enough to see what's on the shelves, or are old enough to read? It twigs me.
More gendering.... even of something as simple as musical instruments. Clearly only girls play piano and only boys play drums. Because girls are classy and delicate and smart, and boys are loud and like to bang on things. Yeah. Further underscored by having multiple representations of girls liking piano (and no boys doing so), and multiple representations of boys liking drums (and no girls doing so).
There are three different boys used for marketing guitars -- one white boy with dark hair, one white boy with blond hair, and one black boy (diversity!). Almost the guitars have one of these three boys, with the white boys dominating, of course.One guitar -- on this shelf of eight stacks of guitars -- portrays a girl. She is white. And she is dressed in pink, as if to assure, "I'm REALLY a girl, even though I play guitar!".
This shit is horrifying.
I am so effing disturbed. Barbie's target market is 3 years and up. Where does this ripped near-naked mantoy come in??The only thing I can think of is that Mattel is marketing to the Twilight fangirls (who are happy adults).... on one of the Pepto-Bismol pink aisles of Toys"R"Us. Or, alternatively, Mattel is super smart and knows that their 3-8 year olds know that older women think about shit like this, and therefore will think having a mantoy of their own is cool -- even if they don't "get it". WTF, Mattel. I'm creeped out in either case.
(It also leaves me wondering: are the Ken-like series still eunuchs beneath their shorts? How deep are they willing to take the fanservice?)
As "standards of beauty" change to be more impossible, so do the action figures -- of both men and women. Toys for boys have gotten more ripped right there alongside toys for women getting more busty.
ReplyDelete"The physical dimensions of five contemporary action figures were measured and compared to their original counterparts to determine whether their physiques have become more muscular from their original designs. The circumferences of the neck, chest, arm, forearm, waist, thigh, and calf were measured three separate times using a Scale Master II model 6325. The mean score was then used in subsequent analyses. Except for the waist, it was determined that the body parts of current action figures were significantly larger when compared to those of their original counterparts. The results of this study indicate that action figures have become more muscular and larger over the last 25 years. Furthermore, the increase in action figure dimensions may contribute to the multifactoral development of an idealized body type that focuses on a lean, muscular physique. This occurrence may particularly influence the perceptions of preadolescent males."
-- abstract from a paper entitled "Change in sociocultural ideal male physique: An examination of past and present action figures" (Baghurst, Hollander, Nardella and Haff; 2006); available: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B75DB-4J6W6XW-2&_user=10&_coverDate=03%2F31%2F2006&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1301112326&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=b7e3c4ee2895a9fef73811f2907bf987