Sweet J has become incredibly interested in the Lion Cub's (aka Kid B's) daily care. She's present--and helping--for every diaper change, bath, etc. She picks out the cub's clothes every day and helps to burp her. Last night she spent about ten minutes "burping" me. Solon and I have decided to bite the bullet and buy J her first baby doll.
So I'm online today looking at dolls at Toys 'R Us, trying to find a doll that doesn't petrify me. (Ever really thought about how scary dolls can be? Half of them look like prom queens or drag queens--fun, but not a good doll for feeding and diaper chages--and the other half are way too realistic, in a vaguely menacing sort of way.) I see a link for the You and Me African-American My First Doll and click to take a look. There's a separate link for the Caucasian version, but I'm thinking that a doll of a different race would be especially nice for J, particularly since the next G-H sibling will be adopted and there's a strong likelihood that he won't look like her.
Here's the thing that interests me: the You and Me African-American doll is about as black as I am... and I'm of light-ish to medium complexion, even in the middle of summer. I know there are some darker skinned dolls out there, but even they peak at cafe au lait. I'm really concerned about the message this sends to children of color who can't find a doll that looks like them. But I'm equally concerned about my blond and blue daughter, J. I hate that we live in a culture that idolizes her version of beauty at the expense of others. (The cub, for example, is shaping up to be a brown and brown, like her mama.) And I hate that this starts so young.
I'm in no way surprised at this finding, in general. Even a Pollyanna like me* is hip to the frequent shittiness of our culture. But take a look at the You and Me Doll. Even a cynic will find this one shocking.
* Shout out to Harrogate, who loves Pollyanna as much as I do.
3 comments:
Holy smokes, that's the whitest black baby doll I've ever seen! But, I noticed Toys R Us also has the much blacker Baby Born Magic Potty 17" African American Doll, and Wal-Mart has the Baby Alive Wets & Wiggles African American Doll. I wonder if this is a case where you have to be in the know about where to find "authentic" baby dolls of color? I also find it disturbing that some of the dolls come with--apparently born with-- a full afro. Seriously? An afro-headed newborn?
I totally get everything you're saying, Megs--and we talked about some of this this weekend. So I googled African American dolls, and I found one that is, in fact, darker than cafe au lait: http://www.sleepysoft.com/site/480020/product/788. And here's a bonus: it is affordable and has a diaper that Sweet J can change. She isn't the least bit scary either, if I do say so myself.
I've done some reading on this before (I'll checklater and see if I can find the source) but the intriguing thing that keeps being repeated is that clearly ethnic dolls don't sell. Not at a rate that makes it feasible to for the major toy companies to produce them in andy sort of profitable amount.
The reasons seem to be many. First, at, what, 15% of the population?, and trending poorer, African Americans aren't a key demographic for mass-produced dolls with any sort of specific detail. More so, market research shows that the prejudice toward Aryan baby dolls kicks in outside of the home, that the parents and, more so, the children want a doll that looks like everyone else's. The mainstreaming that kids go through as they interact with "normality" outside the home makes individualized dolls less attractive than race specific.
I would also argue that, as you bring up with the afros, the mass production of cheap extruded plastic characatures of babies can all too easily create flat-out offensivly cartoonish dolls, which the white population isn't offended by (see Cabbage Patch Dolls) but that are one step away from Monchichi dolls elsewhere.
I give you this printing error as example: http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/uncyclopedia/images/thumb/c/c3/Black_SpongeBob_SquarePants.jpg/200px-Black_SpongeBob_SquarePants.jpg
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