The omnipresent practice of denying girls action figures has somehow hit a new low. Remember how in the Jurassic World movie, most of the dinosaurs—especially Chris Pratt’s Raptor squad—were constantly referred to as girls? Well, as Jurassic World action figures, they’ve all been genderswapped into boys.
Yes, the packaging for every single Raptor action figure—as well as most of the other dinosaur figures—refers to each dinosaur as “he,” as seen in this product description from Hasbro’s official site. Because apparently, Hasbro toy executives believe one of more of the following things:
1) Boys will not buy female dinosaur figures
2) Parents will not buy boys female dinosaur figures, because genderless animal toys referred to as female on the packaging might still somehow make their children gay
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3) Girls can not possibly want to buy figures of dinosaurs and the sun will literally burn out in the sky before that changes
4) The fact that the actual movie Jurassic World identifies these dinosaurs as female, and audiences have been 100% okay with that, somehow means nothing when it comes to the action figures
Look, I know we talk about the vast gender inequality of the toy market on io9 a lot, but this is beyond the pale. It’s insanity. These are toys of dinosaurs. They don’t have any visual sexual characteristics. The movie explicitly refers to the dinosaurs as females, and has still made a zillion dollars with not a single person on earth complaining about the dinosaurs’ genders.
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If a goddamn pronoun is what’s preventing you or your kid from buying a Raptor action figure, don’t get the figure. Go get therapy.
[The Geekiary via Gamma Squad]
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Contact the author at rob@io9.com.
