September 30, 2002
-
If that last link didn’t creep you out immensely, there’s also this and this.
Now, when I was a kid, I had G.I. Joes. I had a bunch of ‘em, and they were big fun. They weren’t fighting a war, they were going on safaris and setting up base camps. They were driving their big orange tracked vehicle through the swamp, because it was cool to drive a big orange tracked vehicle through the swamp.
They had lifelike buzzcuts, eagle eyes and kung-fu grip. They weren’t dressed like ‘peace keepers.’
I remember one time I saved up my lawn care money and got a new G.I. Joe. He was tall and strong and buzz-cutty and kung-fu-y, but didn’t have the eagle eyes. And he was black.
I only remember at the time that the black cashier asked me a few extra times if I had really, really found what I was looking for. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
I took him home and he hung out with my other two white G.I. Goes. Pun not intended. Thus, I can say that as a child, I had a multicultural paramilitary experience.
Quite the contrast to the creepy fascism of Desert Storm toys.
Comments (6)
Don’t forget our generation had Army Men by the bagful, and they were all green. And in my house, green-on-green crimes against humanity were committed, all in the name of juvenile amusement.
If we ever reach the point where we can buy bags of green Iraqis, THEN I’ll be shocked.
holy fuck. what’s wrong with toymakers????????
Guns aren’t safe for kids…but toy guns are!
Weapons have always been toys for children (just in our short history: slingshots, bbguns, cowboys and indians gear, etc).
But the next thing you know, we’re going to have nuclear fucking warheads packaged by Hasbro.
“are you sure this is what you want?”
scary.
*sigh*
grandpa didn’t like us watching GI Joe when he was around because all these people got shot at and no one ever died.
I loved the buzzcuts on the GI Joes. They were fuzzy.
Grandpa may have had a point, though. Where do you draw the line? If you show kids cartoons and no one ever gets hurt, won’t they think they can’t get hurt doing the same things?
On the other hand, we don’t want to show our kids any violent imagery because we’re afraid that might scare them or hurt them psychologically.
So, which is it?
You have the best vocabulary!
Comments are closed.