Islam is the light

When making Maddie's Christmas list this year, I actually took her to Wal-Mart and let her walk around the toy aisle to see what she would be interested in. Every other year I have just made the decisions for her, but she is old enough now to know what she likes. She gravitated towards a baby doll that moved her arms, legs and head and talked. The doll came with a bottle and a teething ring and was very adorable. It was the Little Mommy Real Loving Baby Cuddle and Coo Doll......I know, long name. I added it to her list.

While we were up in the mountains we had reason to be at Wal-Mart for a while (this to be explained in a later blog) and as a distraction for our two year old who had been in the car for far too long we went to the toy aisle so that she could "play" with the toys. We ran into a shopping cart full of toys and on top was the doll I had on Maddie's list. I picked it up and showed it to Dan since I had told him about it but he had yet to see it. There happened to be a Wal-Mart associate stocking the shelves on the aisle that we were on and when she saw me pick up the doll she informed us that we could not buy it because they were recalling them. I asked her why and she told us because when the dolls were supposed to be cooing they were actually saying "Islam is the light" and "Satan is the king," and "vote for Obama." She told me this in all seriousness and even held the doll up for me to listen and hear the words for myself. I listened. I heard nothing but coos and gagas. I told her as much, and she explained to me that this particular dolls' battery was getting low and if I found another one with a better battery I would be able to hear it clearly.

Seriously?

We got home and looked the whole thing up and there actually is a big thing going on with this baby doll. There are articles written by fox news and recordings of the alleged pro-Islam and satanic messages posted on YouTube. Parents are crying out that these dolls need to be taken off the shelves because they are corrupting our children. I don't believe that Fisher Price is actually recalling the dolls, but retailers are actively taking them off the shelves because the public is demanding they do so. This is such malarkey!!! Does history have to continue to repeat itself?? Will we ever get wise and stop making fools of ourselves?

This isn't the first doll or child's toy that has spouted off evil or racial/religious slurs and it won't be the last....or more accurately it isn't the first or last parent who hears words that aren't really there and throws their hands up in outrage and demands action be taken so that their child won't be corrupted. People hear what they want to hear and once the first looney tooney exclaimed that Cuddle and Coo Baby was trying to convert their child to Islam everyone heard it.
Do you remember when there was controversy over the teletubbies a few years back? The purple one was ambiguous in his sexual orientation thus he was gay and parents started hearing the doll say (I really hate to use this word) "fagot, fagot and bite my butt."

But a good question to ponder is why on earth would Fisher Price make a doll that spouts off about Satan and Islam? What's in it for them?!?! Other than a waste of the millions of dollars that went into making and marketing and now not selling the Cuddle and Coo doll. What could they possibly gain from trying to corrupt our youth? You would think that a toy company would want people to buy their toys instead of boycotting them, but I can see where spreading their religious propaganda would outweigh their desire to make money and continue to be in the publics' good graces. *sarcasm* As far as I can tell Fisher Price does not have strong ties with the middle east nor do they seem to promote any religious beliefs, Christian, Islamic, Hindu or otherwise.

I don't understand why our society does this. It may be a horse of a different color but this all reminds me of book burning in the past. A small group of people decided that they dont like the content and thus books needed to be destroyed. A small group of people decide they don't like what they think they hear a doll saying and thus it needs to be taken off the shelf and made unavailable to the public. What happened to people making decisions for themselves? Since when does Wal-Mart know whats better for my kids than I do? When did Gary Rofkahr from Owasso, Oklahoma become the voice that retailers are listening to? Don't get me wrong, I understand that stores have the right to carry whatever merchandise they want, but it just seems ridiculous to me that they would make this decision based on something that is undeniably false. The Cuddle and Coo baby doll is NOT telling my child that "Islam is the light," or that "Satan is the king," (or even to "vote for Obama," which seems to only be something the Wal-Mart associate was hearing lol) it's just not.

Hopefully Wal-Mart will get wise and stop listening to crazies and put the Cuddle and Coo baby back on the shelves. I am not planning on taking it off Maddie's Christmas list, but I'm not feeling very optimistic that it will be available. Dumb. I'm gonna go now and get my old records outta storage and play them backward so that I can hear Satan.

Adios.