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Mar 11

Children’s Misuse of Technology

In the past couple weeks we have talked about technology and its effect on children. In this article,School Bullying- it’s not what it used to be, talks about how children have started misusing the computers and technology that are given to them from educational purposes. We talked about, especially with The Veldt, how technology is affecting children and the way they view society. It is clear through this article that this effect is still an issue decades later.

The article talks about how through the use of Facebook, Twitter, email, IM, etc… children have begun cyber-bullying. It used to be that children would be bullied at school, but once they left school for the day they could escape it. However, now children have found ways to continue bullying through all hours of the day. The article says that children will hear alerts from their computer at around 3 o’clock in the morning from people bullying them. John Martin, the writer of this article, says that when schools provide computers for their children to use it allows for the possibility of misuse by the children. Also, through the creation of smart phones, children can send messages to multiple kids at a time. This allows for kids to send rumors and information to many kids at one time.

Technology and new innovations are good things. However, these new generations of children that are used to all of the technology are not treating them as they are supposed to be used. Creators of the iPhone and Facebook were not trying to find ways for children to use these harmfully. However, the children are so used to these things that it seems ok for them to use them harmfully. This draws a whole other issue of the attitudes of the new generation, which I am not going to get in to.

Cortland Computer, School computer lab

Mar 10

Little and Cute

One of my most enjoyed childhood toys was Polly Pocket. She was not only exciting because the enormous amount of clothing my parents bought to compliment their purchase of the doll, but she was small enough to put in my pocket and take with me anywhere I went. Trust me, Polly was the accompaniment of choice for several doctor’s visits, school plays, and movie nights.

Created in 1983 by Chris Wiggs, Polly was  not introduced to stores until 1989 and finally picked up by the massive toy producing company Mattel in the year 1998.  She was very similar to other doll lines, such as Barbie and Bratz, but her conveniently small and all around plastic reality (clothes, hair, and body) gave her an edge her competitors did not have. Polly did  not come alone. She had several friends: Shani, Lea, Lila, Crissy, Kerstie, Rick, and Todd. This gives the consumer enough characters to create not only an elaborate scene for play, but a huge wardrobe to create for each doll owned. It was this thought that monetarily appealed to Mattel in late 1998 and led to the creation of Fashion Polly!

The initial purchase of a Polly Pocket doll, and a few complimentary fashion items, starts at about $10 with additional items ranging anywhere from $10-40.

This doll line definitely appeals to the recent increase in things colored pink in an attempt to reach a young, female consumer. It is also made small to appeal to younger children who feel a sense of control while playing with smaller items. The fact that Polly has so many friends and extra accessories to accompany her adventures makes for a great business item that keeps consumers needing to purchase more. There is also an incentive to update your wardrobe and doll as the child continues to play with the items by deliberately making the line out of plastic: a material that is sure to run down after lots of usage.

Polly Pocket Commerical from 1994

Polly Pocket and Friends

 

Mar 9

Care Bears Birthday

I watched an episode of the 1985 Care Bears season. When the opening song came on, I immediately saw signs of Cross’ argument that the Program Length Commericals created a separate world for children not related to the realistic one that they would grow up in. During the opening song, one Care Bear sings “I don’t want to be a cook or a fireman, I don’t want to play trombone in the marching band, I just want to be a Care Bear like you!”. This shows that the children were being told not to have ideas of growing up to be something realistic, like a fireman, but instead being told to wish to “be a Care Bear”. During the episode however, the Care Bears visit a real boy who is upset that his parents are neglecting him and not throwing him a birthday party because his baby sister is being born. He’s resentful and angry at his parents. His friend tries to convince him to make a mess of his house to “get back at his parents, and although he’s a little hesitant, he still does do it some. The episode is all about the Care Bears trying to teach the boys a lesson of caring and understanding. The Care Bear’s attempt does reference the real world, as it tries to teach its viewers a moral of the story lesson. In the end, like all happily ever afters, the two boys learn to “care” because of their lesson, and they are happy about seeing the little baby sister. The birthday boy says he understands why his parents couldn’t throw him a party, and he still loves his new little sister. This episode does contradict Cross’ argument, as the Care Bears are trying to actually teach kids a lesson, as opposed to giving a thirty minute, unrealistic commercial of their toy.

Mar 9

G.I. Faux

In the 1986 G.I. Joe cartoon episode, “Computer Complications”, the Joes and Cobras are at their ‘good vs. evil’ antics again. In this particular program-length commercial, both regimes are after a radioactive stash of antimatter located at the bottom of the ocean. The antimatter is so dangerous that the Joes have to send in robot submarines to recover the radioactive substance but not before Cobra orders a strike to dismantle the operation and intercept the antimatter for himself. While many battles ensue at the Joe’s ocean platform base, Cobra and his entourage of baddies try to invade the Joe’s home base to reprogram the submarines. Zarana, Cobra’s stealth and tech specialist, goes undercover as a sexy cadet who seduces and subdues the head of top secret operations for the Joes, Mainframe.

 

The creation and success of the G.I. Joe PLC through the 1980’s was in great part due to the success of the futuristic Star Wars trilogy from which G.I. borrowed ideas of weapons, space-tech, and most importantly the transcendence of the good vs. evil genre condensing it into a 30 minute cartoon. Drawing upon Gary Cross’s concerns with children and their fantasy play worlds, G.I. Joe: Great American Hero offered very little other than the notion of “good vs. evil”. In fact, the show ended up in stalemates so often that it was hard to tell the difference between the two Cobras and the Joes. Cross adds that “because it was so unrealistic, it was not to take seriously” (298). The narrative of this PLC coincides with Cross’s idea that when kids take home these action figures and their miniature laser canons instead of toy guns modeled after government issued military equipment, they are disconnecting the “national narrative” of war play. The result: parents ended up ignoring their children’s war play and because it was so appealing, the parents of two thirds of American children between the ages of five and eleven ended up ignoring their children’s play in general.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E45UHF7kfM&feature=related

 

Mar 9

Caring Out of Control

In “Spinning Out of Control,” Gary Cross argues that  children’s television  began to focus on fantasies rather than prepare children for the adult world with the emergence of the “program-length commercial” during the 1980s (290). In order to analyze Cross’s argument, one must be familiar with these “program-length commercials.” Therefore, we will first study an episode of “Care Bears,” a popular 1980s PLC, so we can apply Cross’s argument to the television show.

In the episode “The Long Lost Care Bears,” the Care Bears come across a photo album of the Care Bear family. While looking through the pictures, they come across a photo of two Care Bears that they do not recognize. However, before they are not able to really study the picture in detail because the Caring Meter drops and they must go help who is in trouble. As they are on their way to the victims, the Cloud Mobile becomes caught in a snow storm and crashes. After enduring an avalanche, the Care Bears wake up in a valley. They then meet Perfect and Polite, the two bears that were in the photo in the photo album. These bears saved them from the blizzard and brought them back to their village. After exploring what seems to be a perfect village, the Care Bears realize Perfect and Polite were who the meter was sending them to help. Polite and Perfect were sad because they felt they had no friends or family in the valley. So, the Care Bears invite them back to Care-a-lot to become Care Bears and become a part of a big family of friends. After arriving back in Care-a-lot, Perfect and Polite cannot handle the Care Bear training as they fail at every task. They decide that  perhaps being a Care Bear is not meant for them and decide they will go back to the village. As they are discussing returning to the village, the Caring Meter once again drops and leads them back to the valley. When they return, however, the valley has been hit by a blizzard and is not longer a paradise. A village family is caught in the middle of the blizzard in their cabin and will not leave in fear of freezing to death. Though Perfect and Polite were scared to talk to them before, they decide to try to in order to save them. However, when they will not leave because they are scared of freezing to death, the bears decide to try a “Care Bear Stare” to melt the snow. While doing the stare, Polite and Perfect are unable to stabilize the power of the stare and lose control, causing them to fall to the ground. After they fall and tears fall onto the symbols on their stomachs, glowing spirits raise from their “tummy symbols” to the sky, and suddenly all the snow begins to melt and the valley returns to its normal climate. The villagers thank the bears for saving their lives. Polite and Perfect then decide to stay in the valley rather than return to Care-a-lot because they realize they do have friends in the  valley with the villagers.

Cross’s argument is somewhat supported in this “program-length commercial” based on several factors. First, unless there really is a Care-a-lot in the sky with Care Bears that we do not know about, then the show is set in a fantasy land with fantasy characters, which is what Cross argues is one of the major problems with the PLCs because they are not preparing children for the real world. However, despite the fact that the show is unrealistic, it does contain morals within the story line. For example, in the episode “The Long Lost Care Bears,” Perfect and Polite realize they really do have friends when they make an effort and talk to others more often. This can teach children that, even when they feel lonely and as if they have no friends, they can make friends with the people around them if they have the right attitude and are a little out going. Therefore, Cross is correct in his argument that the PLCs are set in fantasies rather than real life scenarios, but fails to recognize the fact that the “program-length commercials” have underlining themes that contain morals and are set in a fantasy in order to make the visuals and story line more appealing to the child viewer (296).

Here is a link for the “The Long Lost Care Bears” Care Bears episode:
http://youtu.be/w9672GeM-N8
(Embedding disabled.)

 

Mar 9

“Hey, Hey, Hey!”

   In Queens, New York 1992, Five African American men started a

"Fat Albert and the Gang"

Bill Cosby's "Fat Albert and the Gang" related to African American children and became honored and noted for its educational content

clothing line geared toward the African American community.  Their brand was supposed to cater to all cultures and be in the price range of the lower class African Americans.  They named their brand FUBU, which the majority believes is an acronym for the phrase “For Us By Us.”

   Junior High, for me, was the year when young teenagers really began to focus more on their appearance in school. Everyone kept their jeans starched “extra crispy” where shorts could almost stand up on their own when you opened the pant legs.  During this time, FUBU had become one of the hottest brands you would see walking down every hallway.  Printed on some of their clothing were animations of Ali, the Globe Trotters, and “Fat Albert and the Gang,” an animated series directed by Comedian Bill Cosby.  Ali and the Globe Trotters stood for African American figures that beat racial barriers, however “Fat Albert and the Gang” stood for much more than historical figures.  Bill Cosby created the animation in order to relate to the African American children in society.  Similarly to Black literature at the time, Fat Albert was known to be very educational as well as entertaining for its young viewers.  Similarly to Black literature at the time, Fat Albert were one of the few programs on television that related to the black community.  According to Laretta Henderson in her article Ebony Jr.!: The Rise and Demise of an African American Children’s Magazine, the “lack of literature for Black children was not a new concern for educators of African American children.”

   Out of all the FUBU clothing I’ve seen up and down the halls of my Jr. High, almost every printed animation was Fat Albert and his gang.  Reflecting back, I wonder if all of us embraced Bill Cosby’s animation because it appealed to our generation.  The cartoon first aired in 1969 and was off the air before I was even born.  Most of the people born in the mid to late 80’s, who wore FUBU, had never even seen the cartoon prior to the clothing line.  This could serve as a prime example for African American children learning to read; images and story lines that relate to their character allows the literature to capture that child’s attention.

   From Bill Cosby to FUBU to Ebony Jr., their products influenced the children of the “…black community by defining Blackness and by focusing on Black achievements that were ignored by schools and the White press.”  Books like “The Brownies’,” helped “make ‘colored’ normalized” in society (L. Henderson pg649-60).  After studying all the harmful effects of media in our society and educating myself on the viewpoints of the protestors, I’m still not a believer.  Television, literature, and advertising has heavily impacted the youth in our black community by breaking down barriers in masses which may only be reached by the media.

Mar 9

The Woes of Mr. Potato Head

“In 1952, Hassenfield Brothers, a maker of pencil boxes and other school supplies, began advertising its new toy product, Mr. Potato Head, on TV.” (Chudacoff 172) The original Mr. Potato Head was actually relevant to a potato, or any fruit or vegetable for that matter. They were sold by Hasbro in $1-2 accessory packs to stick into fruit that was bought separately by the consumers’ own means. The entire idea was that children could create faces that never looked the same.

“A crucial shift involved consumer items for very young children. Soft, cuddly toys, like the teddy bear, appeared in American markets” (Stearns 7) like many of those things, Mr. Potato Head lost its original intent and Hasbro started producing plastic “potatoes” with holes for the accessories. Children didn’t get a chance to play with fruit anymore. Mr. Potato Head has created a huge revenue as he was featured in the Disney movie “Toy Story.” When I went to Disney world 12 years ago I remember going on a “3D adventure” with Mr. Potato Head. All of this was born out of simple appendages stuck into fruits and vegetables.

Screen shot of the search "Mr. Potato Head" on Google, showing the "classic" look of Mr. Potato Head, in all of which he looks the same

The true value of this toy was that it promoted creativity in children. They could make a potato look happy and a squash look mean. The plastic potato that is now sold was obviously a successful way to make more money from parents who don’t want their children wasting food and have to deal with the tantrums from the children who want to keep rotten Mr. and Mrs. Cantaloupe Heads. However, now all Potato Heads look the same. There are only so many looks you can give the potato without buying more accessories to go with it. Mr. Potato Head went from being a $1-2 toy, to essentially a gender neutral Barbie, always needed a new accessory. This fixed the problem that “boys and girls were attracted to dissimilar products,” (Chudacoff 180) but created a new one: You have to continue to buy accessories to personalize your Mr. and Mrs. Potato Heads. An accessory kit can run about $20 each according to Amazon but at the rate of childhood boredom, will one be enough?

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