I find this campaign patently ridiculous. Here you have a company that actually created dolls that look like little girls instead of hookers and the religious right pounces on them because they have donate support to a girls group.
Oh right, the girls group like many girls groups may also be offering information to the girls that abortion is legal,a and that well..lesbians exist. Well, I hate to break it to you...abortion is legal. General Motors also supports this group....are you going to boycott them too?
BTW, I've been to girls inc web page, clicked on some links and found I didnt' have the time to dig for the page with the abortion/lesbian stuff. It must be very secondary to what they're actually doing.
"Here you have a company that actually created dolls that look like little girls instead of hookers"
According to the founder of the company (pre-Mattel) this was indeed her intent. Part of the marketing strategy behind these dolls was that they were AGE-APPROPRIATE and a wholesome alternative to Barbie the bimbo. I still suspect Mattel is behind this.
I think the point is that people are looking at TOYS as TOYS, not something agendized...
Wouldn't it be nice, fair, respectful to at least offer options and not simply plug one program?
Is it honestly too much to ask to simply keep the agendas out of it altogether??? No one is asking to attach Bibles to Molly's hand or demand that Samantha shun a lesbian classmate...
And FYI friend, it isn't just the "religious right" as you seem to dismissively imply...this is something that my group of friends has discussed and not all of them fit into any one narrow box....
Lots of things exist, but it isn't quite that simple is it? Does the existence of something make it right? Does the legality of something make it right?
Abortion is legal, so was slavery....so was the denial of a woman's right to vote.
And General Motors, FYI, is not geared toward a target audience of 7-12 year olds....I am going to assume that you were just being dramatic without the real belief that a toy company and a car company market to the same folks.
No digging is necessary to find it...my 12 year old managed it in less than 5 minutes before I even knew about the controversy.....she received a band as a party favor and was seeing what the group was about.
As for it being secondary....hard to say....among the feminists I have known and been raised around, it is hardly secondary, in fact it is the raison d'etre.
It is like when I approached the NOW table at a local event to ask them if it was agroup for all women or just liberal ones...she said all women...but after being pressed on a few key issues, abortion, afirmative action etc. she had to admit there was no room for diversity of opinion.
One look at the GI website and by reviewing the organization's leaders interviews on the topic, it is clear that there is not room for diversity of opinion on the topics they present.
I don't know about you, but when that is the case I want my children to see that in black and white regardless of the topic.
You have simplified something that I think is complex, and managed to sneer at those with convictions you disagree with my dismissing them as religious fanatics. Certainly a tactic in debate, but one I hope my children do not embrace.
*applauds* Thank you!
See post 57. There are legitmate reasons for boycotting American Girl but not GM. I really don't care about the corporate citizenship of my car manufacturer, but I do about other businesses. If my church started, corporately, acting like AG did I would leave them. My wife and I just cancelled a subscription to a major journal, which for decades had been considered apolitical and all-American, because their articles started sounding like Washington Post editorials. I can get that elsewhere so they lost one of a million subscribers.
Also consider the slippery slope argument.
Think this through a bit more clearly. It's a matter of choosing one's battles, in the parlance of the industry I work in.
LOL! Why bother? GM is already heading down the tubes. No boycott necessary.