Generations in toyland

There’s a bit of discussion going on in the comments of this posting about what shapes a generation’s collective personality, how it’s about larger forces at work in the culture more than it’s about the quirks and idiosyncrasies on the level of the individual. And I just came across (via one of my favorite bloggers, Atrios), an excellent example of how today’s children are being influenced by what’s happening in the wider society.

Generation Xers, as a reminder, grew up with stuff like this:

Darts_1

Look, they basically gave us lethal weapons to play with, and you didn’t have to ever have a set of Lawn Darts (I never did, and I’m not even sure I ever saw a set as a kid) to have been shaped by the attitudes that led to their creation. The existence of Lawn Darts -- and the fact that so many people bought them for their kids in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s -- speaks volumes about what adults thought about the kids at the time. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a negative spin -- I’m certainly not suggesting that anyone, consciously or unconsciously, wanted kids to die or didn’t care if they did: You could easily spin Lawn Darts as an example of the faith and trust that grownups put in kids, that we were wise enough and mature enough to take care of ourselves. Which is hilarious, in retrospect... and it’s still a demonstration of how Xer kids weren’t coddled in the way that kids probably need to be coddled. Nobody put “Baby on Board” warning signs on cars when we were in car seats. (Hell, did we even have car seats?)

(When were Lawn Darts removed from the market? In 1988, when people again started thinking about children as creatures to be protected...)

Which brings us to this delightful toy, which all the kids will want for Christmas in 2005:

Security

Are kids who grow up playing with this going to think that homeland security is fun? Are we on the verge of Secretary of Defense Barbie? Are we creating a generation of Americans who won’t see anything wrong with living in a police state?

A generational zeitgeist in the making before your very eyes...

8 Comments

by bats on October 12, 2005 2:46 PM

I grew up in Phoenix in the 60s, and I never saw a lawn dart (then again, unless you had a pool in your back yard, no one was insane enough to go outdoors for most of the day during the summer). I do remember nearly puncturing the major vein in my wrist with a regular dart, though, and I must've been eight or nine; the potential for danger was there, and yet my folks trusted me not to do something stupid (well, I didn't bleed to death, so I guess their trust was well-founded). The Whammo Company always made the best, most hazardous toys: air guns that could take out an ear-drum, Slip 'n' Slides that were never long enough to prevent grassburns or gravelburns, Water Wiggles that had to be responsible for knocking a lot of kids' front teeth out...the list was endless. We still joke that the whole litany of toy companies of the period wasn't complete without mentioning Whammo (even the name sounds perilous!): "It's Mattel -- It's Swell!" "It's Kenner -- It's Fun!" "It's Whammo -- It's Dangerous as Hell!"

by David C on October 12, 2005 3:50 PM

My version of "car seats" growing up was "kids can clamber around the back section of the station wagon freely." I had vaguely thought lawn darts were banned during our GenX childhood period, but apparently not. Banned in 1988, though there is still a shadowy secret underground of lawn darts enthusiasts lurking in the darkness! (Adults, yes, it must be admitted, but some of them may have or know youngsters! Think of the children!) http://www.jarts.com/media.htm Anyhow, I never encountered lawn darts in my childhood, but I *was* the proud owner of dangerous pre-recall Colonial Vipers and Cylon Raiders that fired real missiles! http://www.retrocrush.com/archive/deadly/ And, no, even as a kid, I wasn't about to let the guvmint get my hands on them!

by Orodemniades on October 12, 2005 4:43 PM

Just after I graduated from college, a friend of mine from Jersey (she was visiting me in Vermont) took a look at my neighbor's toddler, who was munching on some dirt, and said, "I'll never let my children get so dirty!" I was all like, Dude, he's three. Cuz, I don't have kids, but unless you live in Love Canal or Chernobyl, chances are your little darling ain't gonna keel over from a handful of dirt. I say, let Lawn Darts rule! And swingsets! And teeter-totters!

by Kathy A on October 12, 2005 6:30 PM

Back in the late '70s, we had neighbors with Lawn Darts, and we loved to go over and play with them. The parents were around (somewhere), so everything was cool. We weren't dumb, after all, and if something did happen, the usual response was not "I'll call a lawyer!" but "Well, you learned your lesson and this won't happen again, will it?" As for car seats, one of the most illustrative TV bits I've ever seen from the 1970s was a news interview from about 1973 or so (judging by the clothes and hair style) with a mother sitting in her car next to her 8 y.o. son, talking about her dislike of seatbelts. "I've never needed them before, and my kid doesn't, either. I just don't see why they're even talking about making us wear them!" The first state mandatory child seatbelt law wasn't even passed until 1978.

by Newbia on October 12, 2005 8:16 PM

I'm not Generation X, but I still agree with you. Do you watch stand up comedy? So many comics mention how their kids are kept so much safer than when the parents were children. The thing I never understand is why they sound so *nostalgic* about it. They talk about parents hitting them or pushing them down a hill with no helmet when they went on a bicycle, and seem upset or surprised that they can't do it to their own kids.

by MaryAnn on October 12, 2005 9:29 PM

Exactly. We never wore seatbelts or helmets, and we all turned out okay. Well, except for those of us whose brains ended up all over the street, but how many kids did that really happen to? Not too many...

by Mark on October 13, 2005 8:45 AM

I remember playing with those "deadly" lawn darts as a kid over at my grandmas house. My brothers and I would toss those things all over the yard. Someone mentioned Slip n Slides and I thought of the metal spikes used to attach the slide to the ground. We would gash ourselves on those things routinely as they popped out of the ground. Any wonder I'm still around today.

by David C on October 13, 2005 3:52 PM

I think there's a difference between prudent safety measures and the kind of crazy overprotectiveness that leads to things like banning dodgeball. For instance, from a risk perspective, people of any age have a (relative to most other risks) quite high chance of getting killed in an automobile accident. So scientifically designed car seats, air bags, and the like are things I don't think anybody should have a serious problem with. It's the stuff that *doesn't* have any rational basis beyond busybodies wanting to control every aspect of peoples' lives that annoys.

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Generations in toyland

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