She’s so right. (As usual.)
Oh, it’s not selling unsafe toys to American kids that’s so shameful. What’s fucking shameful is that we–and I include myself–only give a shit about the American kids whose rooms are stuffed to the gills with cheap-ass toys made in sweatshops in China, whose workers are often not much older than children and who not only handle the lead paint or other toxins that we don’t want our kids to have even minimal contact with, but do so for 12 hours or more a day, for a few cents per week, while living in cities where the air is polluted by the same industrial toxins that we’re suddenly so concerned about.
Gah. It cannot be denied. What’s to be done? I will say, all the toy recalls *have* made me rethink what I buy for the Hatchling, both for safety reasons and for the reasons Bitch cites above. I mean, hell, she already has more crap than she knows what to do with, and often her favorite toys are things like my measuring spoons or toilet paper tubes. And when I stop and think about it, I mean DUH, of course I’d rather buy her one or two really top notch toys than nine or ten shitty cheap ones. But then we get to Target, and her eyes light up at some plastic geegaw, and it’s only $5.99, and, and, and … And gross. Feh. I gotta stop that. Mass consumption on that scale is good for exactly nobody’s children. Next time we’re at the store I pledge to take the time to remember that what I’m buying affects more kids than just my own. Who’s with me?
