Mattel debuts first Barbie with hearing aids
cbsnews.com
cbsnews.com
I wouldn't consider myself very knowledgable such as topics like these, so just curious about what the thinking is behind it.
So I hope the appeal of toys like these extends beyond just “seeing myself represented” - ideally, kids get to play with a variety of likenesses beyond just “the one that looks like me”.
(Aside: the final paragraph of the article is 100% unnecessary, corporate virtue signaling, with no relation to anything else in the article aside from being Barbie related.)
But it's certainly equally important to have both.
Edit: I mean both outcomes: people able to find dolls like them and people able to play with diverse dolls.
I’ve got a modern set of hearing aids that I actually ordered last week. They have Bluetooth built in, so they will actually function as earbuds themselves, allowing me to answer calls or listen to music and so on. So the reverse is already happening where the hearing aid acts as headphones.
One last thing to consider is that ear buds occlude the ear completely, where some hearing aids (like mine) are designed to physically allow sound through. In my case it’s better than total occlusion since one of my ears only has partial loss (total loss in the other).
They do get programmed to compensate for the specific hearing loss of the individual, but if there was an easy way to take a hearing test and program the earbuds at home to match, that would be amazing. The transparency mode on the Apple AirPods already uses the mic to pass through sound, but I don’t know of any way to amplify specific frequencies or to transmit sound from one side to the other (for one-sided deafness).
https://www.today.com/popculture/popculture/sashay-playroom-...
Or is male body represetation is still tied to unrealistic body standards?
Underrepresented people have this relatively new platform called the internet that helps them find their voice and be heard by other people, sometimes even if just shit posting and doing some variation of "drunk dialing." I'm guessing that's a factor here.
I shall be waiting for the Barbie doll announcement.
I've seen it countless times, for example in the Warhammer community (in case you aren't familiar, Warhammer is a tabletop game where you wage war with toy soldiers; there are also countless videogame spinoffs). A major point of contention is that Space Marines, the poster boys of the Warhammer 40K universe, can only be men. Why? Because current fans say so. To be clear: Space Marines are genetically engineered, cyberenhanced, drug-addled monstrosities -- any resemblance to actual humans is long gone. So fans (usually male) argue that women cannot be supersoldiers because women are weaker (ignoring countries who do employ women in frontline combat roles), even though Space Marines are engineered monsters wearing powered armor.
This is the stuff of endless flamewars. But riddle me this: a common argument these very vocal male fans deploy is "of course, players are so fragile they can only play with toy soldiers that resemble them, that's why women supposedly need female Space Marines!". But they are the ones threatening to rage quit the game if Games Workshop (the IP owner) ever changes the background lore of the game to allow female Space Marines. Women never threaten to quit because Space Marines are currently a male only club.
It's not like female Space Marines or disabled Barbie are going to prevent anyone from buying the previous versions of the toy. They just introduce more options where there were fewer.
Children don’t care about a skinnier Ken and a disabled Barbie. Not because of the special attributes of these iterations, mind you, they don’t really see these differences yet anyway. Maybe a few parents will appreciate those but that should be about it.
Countless iterations of the same thing is what Barbie was already doing. There's a parody of that in The Simpsons' Stacy Malibu ("it has a new hat!"). This seems a bit riskier and slightly more profound than giving Barbie a new dress. I looked at the photo of the new dolls and they don't look like iterations of the same thing: each looks strikingly different to the rest.
Then again, do people look at Playmobil or Legos and complain that they are "countless iterations of the same thing"? Because they certainly are!
As for the differences: my 2 year old sees them already. And even if not, aren't toys also about teaching something?
> Maybe a few parents will appreciate those but that should be about it
How can you speak for parents and know how many will or will not appreciate this?
The way you phrased this, it sounds like you’re implying that expanding your product line to new customers when your sales are declining is a bad idea. But… I can’t imagine how you think businesses work, then. Like, what’s Plan B? Ride the ship into the ground?