Not even pitworthy perhaps. I started to bump a previous thread about AMERICAN DOLLS but it’s old enough to qualify as a zombie thread, so I’ll open a new one:
That’s right- $95 and the proceeds DO NOT go to homeless charities.
I mentioned in the previous thread how floored I was when I saw the beauty salon for American Girl dolls. (Note: this was not a beauty salon that did doll hair- a beauty salon in Alpharetta Georgia mall specifically for American Girl dolls.) It’s one of those things that makes you understand why the Romanovs were hated.
Now you can pay $95 for Homeless Gwen and pay more to have her hair done than the real Gwen would spend on appearance in a year.
My suggestions for more “sociologically conscious” (their own phrase) American Girl dolls:
Abby Orton, the aborted doll- a Victorian slum girl’s fetus that she didn’t get rid of in time. Comes with her own little button hook and gruel bowl.
Minh Lo- the Bangkok child prostitute doll. $95 but you’ll get your money’s worth or the clerks at the store will “have a talk with her”.
Michaela- the autistic doll. Makes the other dolls uncomfortable, but the proceeds go to benefit American Girl doll executives.
Flotatia- the Italian immigrant girl from the Titanic. Put her in the bathtub and watch her not float.
Khadija- the doll who has disgraced her Wahabi father and must be killed unless she manages to escape and moves in with Gwen and her mom in the van down by the river.
Any you’d recommend? And who wants to bet that this may even outsell the Rosie O’Donnell “friend of Barbie” doll from a few years back?
Eva Braun doll: Comes with an vacant stare and an empty smile. Ignores or glosses over any atrocities you may or may not have done to Concentration camp doll*. Bullet hole sold separately.
*[sub]Now with rickets![/sub]
If you follow the links to the American Girl website, the reviews of this doll are decidedly…odd. Rave reviews from apparently grown women. The website has a “relationship to child” blank and several people filled it in “Purchased for self.”
We get the American Girl catalog every fall/winter as a holdover from the previous owners of the house, and we go through it with about the same reaction I’ve seen a lot of people have at sex shops–a lot of eeeww and WTF? and “People pay good money for this shit? Why?!”
Frankly, I thought it was bad when they had the Depression-era doll, with the stories about how you don’t need money to have fun and how Kit (?) makes her own toys. Like the scooter she made from a discarded orange crate. And now that scooter can be yours for a mere $75. There seems to be a fundamental disconnect between the two messages being sent here, you know?
And yeah, if you’re going to “sociologically conscious” you should donate some of the proceeds to some fund to help solve the problem you’re trying to increase awareness of.
The sort of girls who couldn’t get dates in high school or college because their insanity was obvious even to the most hormone-blinded teenage boy. Now, years later, they’ve matured into lonely, overweight, clinically insane women. If they’re lucky, someone will take pity on them before they devolve into full-grown cat ladies.
Like Jean Teasdale, only without Hubby Rick.
I could see buying an American Girl doll as a display piece, (I like the historical clothes myself), but just the doll itself, not all the freaking accessories. But this “homeless doll” isn’t for a charitable cause? That’s…messed up.
Is there an opportunity, then, for an American Girl Doll Collector Doll? Or do the dolls have to be young enough that The Collector would still mostly look like everyone else?
I’ve liked the American Girl dolls and ideas in the past. Two of my nieces have them and the company is very girl-power! and support equality and empowerment for girls.
I don’t get why there has to be a feel good charitable cause. I mean, when they sold Addy, the escaped former slave, it wasn’t like they were giving money to the NAACP. And yeah, it’s sort of tacky but I don’t see the huge outrage. Though the NY Post article about “OMG, she’s homeless and her father left her and LIBERAL INDOCTRINATION” was awesomely bad to read.