The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood has a problem with the Marvel toys McDonald's has been packaging with their Happy Meals lately. Specifically, they object to clobberin’ time. That is, they think that the Thing promotes violence and the Human Torch will lead kids to set themselves on fire. And they also have a problem with McDonalds hawking junk food, which leads me to believe that they probably just want Micky D’s and Marvel out of the picture all together. Thanks to Bleeding Cool for pointing out this recent bout of overly-PC over-sensitivity.
You know, I sympathize with the stated intention of a group like this. I agree that kids shouldn’t be inundated with advertisements… in public institutions like schools. But McDonald’s is a business nobody has to patron and a campaign like this just reinforces a ludicrous “magic mind control” notion. That is, McD is forcing kids to get their super-sized fries and violent toys, while somehow rendering their parents both oblivious and powerless to do anything about it. If you don't want your kids playing with certain toys or eating certain foods, then you make that choice and stop them, yourself. Maybe there needs to be a campaign for a competent parenthood, instead.
Anyway, what makes this protest even more asinine is that these characters have been around for 40 years. Presumably, this people in this campaign played with Fantastic Four toys when they, themselves, were kids. Clobberin’ time was around then, too. Then again, maybe their parents only let them play with dinosaurs and protested the FF cartoon until the Torch got replaced with H.E.R.B.I.E. thus continuing the cycle.
Tom Pinchuk’s the writer of HYBRID BASTARDS! & UNIMAGINABLE. Order them on Amazon here & here.
