We have all seen them, or perhaps even been one: a contented child, eyes focused in myopic bliss upon the cartoons of a Saturday morning. A bowl of Cocoa Puffs or Froot Loops balanced precariously in his or her lap, the child is transfixed by the pixellated landscape. Suddenly the animated reverie is interrupted. A commercial break disrupts the program, and the child anticipates this weekend’s influx of new advertisements. Perhaps the new Barbie or G.I. Joe commercial will be on, extolling the virtues of the latest line of plastic demigods. One begins to wonder: how does the child react to these seemingly innocent toy commercials? Are images and ideas imprinted upon their growing minds that could shape the way they view societal issues such as sexuality and materialism? I have encountered several interesting studies that illuminate the effects of our media-engulfed culture upon the malleable minds of children. These studies reveal close associations between the viewing of toy commercials and children’s recognition of specific brand names and perception of gender roles in society. Using the statistics gathered from the studies th

What about the girls, huh? What girl doesn’t have a Barbie doll? Ah, Barbie, that womanly woman, that very curvaceous plastic incarnation of some 1950-era corporate executive’s fantasy of what a woman apparently should look like. Barbie commercials are not as explosive as G.I. Joe commercials. Rather, these advertisements are upbeat and composed primarily of the color pink. So much pink, in fact, that clinical studies involving lab rats and over-eager college graduate students have shown that prolonged exposure to Barbie commercials inflicts permanent damage on retinal tissue. Okay, so I made that one up. Little girls sit transfixed in front of these advertisements, some hoping to someday look just like Barbie, live just like Barbie, or perhaps have a boyfriend as blatantly mindless and tractable as Ken. Barbie seems to float throughout life, each new commercial bringing with it a new job or a new wardrobe or a new wardrobe for her new job or a new job designing wardrobes or maybe just a new horse. What other woman could be the President, drive a Ferrari, be an astronaut, a teacher, a model, have a 36-DDD chest, and still get home from shopping in time to go out with Ken? She is quite the role model.... Or is she? How realistic is this plastic representation of femininity? A woman who had the physical attributes and proportions of Barbie would probably tip over as she gleefully walked on the runway, empty, frozen smile eerily still on her face. Girls would have a hard time looking up to her then.

Let us examine two of the epitomal engendered toys, the G.I. Joe and the Barbie doll. Few American children never had these toys, or at least were never exposed to commercials for these toys. Explosions and the staccato song of gunfire shatter the silence of a Saturday morning when a G.I. Joe commercial rages from the airwaves. Manly men with assault rifles drive vehicles with strangely phallic armaments across barren wastelands to defend America and Grandma and apple pie from the likes of Cobra and Destro. Even today, after the Cold War has ended and the likes of Cobra and Destro have in reality retreated to their posh Balkan estates to formulate arms deals with Middle Eastern countries and sign movie deals with Disney, G.I. Joe is still there, the picture of virility. What child would question the sheer American-ness of such a hero? I myself always hoped some day to become a Cobra because I always liked the bad guys, but that’s beside the point. G.I. Joe brings images of absolute masculinity to many a child....

Susan Willis, in her essay “Gender as Commodity,” states, “Our culture is mass culture, where one of the strongest early influences on gender is the mass toy market.... In today’s toy market there is a much greater sexual division of toys defined by very particular gender traits than I’d say has ever existed before.... Walk into any toy store and you will see, recapitulated in the store’s aisle arrangement, the strict distinction and separation of the sexes along specific gender lines: Barbies, My Little Ponies, and She-Ras in one aisle; He-Man, the Transformers, and Thundercats in another” (404).

As a child, I would never have been caught dead in the “girl toy” section. I did not question this division, it simply was something I grew up with. Now, looking back, I have to ask myself what the possible motivation of the toy industry could be. Is it more profitable to market two lines of many toys, or is it simply an unconscious error on the corporation’s part? I think the toy industry makes a conscious effort to perpetuate this sexual differentiation. As Susan Willis points out in her article, this boy versus girl universe falls apart only when the toy falls out of favor, when it “is thrown helter-skelter in a sale basket with other out-of-favor toys where gender, like the toy, no longer matters” (404-405). This seems to imply that the toy

Some topics in this essay:
GI Joe, Susan Willis, Toy Play”, Santa Claus, Timebomb Brat, Barbie He-Man, Joe Joe, Beast Advertising”, Otnes Kyungseung, Ken Barbie, gi joe, gender roles, toy industry, brand names, otnes kyungseung, santa claus, susan willis, letters santa claus, boys girls, children brand, television commercials, 1500 ads day, essay “gender commodity”, talking barbie dolls, exposed 1500 ads,