Learn Mandarin online - Toys that have little to do with needs of kids

?  ?

Opinion / Commentary

Toys that have little to do with needs of kids

By Gary Cross (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-09-18 07:28

What the chief executive of Mattel, Robert Eckert and other major toy
makers should apologize for is the toys themselves and the way they are
promoted.

When I looked at Mattel's list of recently recalled toys, it became
obvious that something more than our dependence on foreign goods or even
the physical safety of children is at stake here. The problem is that the
toys and the business model that creates them has so little to do with
the needs of children and their parents.

On the list were 56 Polly Pocket sets (including a lip gloss studio
playset), 11 Doggie Daycare toys, four Batman figures, 43 Sesame Street
toys (not just Elmo stacking rings but giggle grabber soccer Elmo and
grow me Elmo sprinkler), 10 Dora the Explorers and more than a score of
assorted figures and cars.

These are designed mostly for preschoolers; none encourage violence and
many feature the cute and caring. But, a parent might ask, why 56 Polly
Pocket sets? Would not a half-dozen meet the needs of any child? And why
teach four year olds the fine points of cosmetics?

Yet most of us are not shocked by this list. Indeed, a business model
that sells endless additions to basic toys even when they have nothing to
do with any recognized child-rearing ideal or even imaginative play seems
natural.

This was not always the case. In the early 1970s, child advocates like
Action for Children's Television recognized that television ads for toys
had a magical power over children. They tried to ban these commercials to
give parents, not toy companies, control over the desires of their
offspring.

In 1978, Michael Pertschuk, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission,
argued that ads appealing to young children were inherently "unfair".

The toy and candy industries, which advertized directly to children,
mobilized and accused the commission and child advocates of trying to
restrict commercial-free speech and of wanting a nanny state.

In 1980, Congress complied by prohibiting the commission from regulating
ads aimed at children.

About the same time, toy makers noticed that their earnings from selling
Star Wars characters were more profitable than the movies themselves and
fully embraced character licensing. Aided by the early 1980s deregulation
of ads, Mattel, Hasbro and others created cartoons that were essentially
program-length commercials. These cartoons, like He-Man and the Masters
of the Universe or Care Bears, promoted toy lines in their story plots
and led to an endless wave of toys based on television and movie
characters.

At the same time, American toy makers outsourced production, and
concentrated on design and marketing, transforming a seasonal industry
(mostly at Christmas) into wave-after-wave of movie-toy promotions. As a
result, in 1987, 60 percent of toys sold in the US were based on licensed
characters, compared with about 10 percent in 1980. Toy sales increased
from $6.1 billion in 1982 to $12.5 billion in 1986.

This was a superb model for business success, but it has not been such a
good way to raise children. Since 1973, the Consumer Product Safety
Commission has set standards and recalled hazardous toys, protecting the
physical safety of children.

But government does nothing to protect children's psychological needs.
Sure, youngsters want this stuff (after all, they see it on television
every day) and they find ways of playing with these toys, sometimes
imaginatively abandoning the commercial back story of the characters.

But the problem is that the fun built into the toy is mostly in receiving
the latest Polly Pocket and adding it to a collection, rather than
playing with it.

Additive - if not addictive - desire is created and satisfied by these
toy lines. They serve little positive purpose other than to teach
children to be good consumers and want all the Dora the Explorer toys.

Many people might associate this selling tactic with violent action
figures or Barbie and Bratz dolls, but PBS Kids' cartoon characters and
Children's Television Workshop (now Sesame Workshop) puppets have been
licensed to the toy companies since 1971.

How many toddlers do you know who are obsessed with anything having to do
with Elmo and Thomas the Tank Engine toys?

Is it any surprise that children are running through their childhoods so
quickly? Not only do many of these licensed toys introduce young people
to fashion and consumerism before they have developed critical judgment,
but we as parents give them the stuff too early. And so much of it is
junk.

Perhaps it is time to rethink the decision to allow the unrestricted
advertising and cartoon promotion of toy lines that has produced
year-round marketing and piles of plastic toys, bought and soon
discarded. After all, we ought to be just as concerned about the impact
of character licensing and toy advertising on our children's psyche as we
are on protecting them from ingesting leaded paint and magnets.

The New York Times Syndicate

(China Daily 09/18/2007 page11)

Hot Talks

* What's your take of this piece of opinion about China?
* Should Beida recruit more recommended students?
* Nude women and Peking Opera: pornography or art?
* War in Iraq lost?
* Costa Rica cut ties with Taiwan: Who's next?

Most Commented/Read Stories in 48 Hours

Learn Chinese, Chinese Online Class, Learning Materials, Mandarin audio lessons, Chinese writing lessons, Chinese vocabulary lists, About chinese characters, News in Chinese, Go to China, Travel to China, Study in China, Teach in China, Dictionaries, Learn Chinese Painting, Your name in Chinese, Chinese calligraphy, Chinese songs, Chinese proverbs, Chinese poetry, Chinese tattoo, Beijing 2008 Olympics, Mandarin Phrasebook, Chinese editor, Pinyin editor, China Travel, Travel to Beijing, Travel to Tibet