As we all know, girls of all ages prefer pink to any other color, from the minute they are born – or before, when they signal to their mothers the need for pink nurseries. So thank goodness we can now get classic board games in pink: from Scrabble to Monopoly to the Ouija board. Gender-specific versions of these games can be found "only at Toys 'R' Us." Mystery Date and LIFE also come in pink editions.
Eeeew, as Summer would say on The O.C. How many points for g-r-o-s-s?
The "Designer's Edition" of Scrabble spells out the words "fashion" (natch) and "fun game" on its cover: "Every word's a winner!" in this perverse beauty contest for words. Here is the official product description:
A timeless classic with a modern makeover, this pink SCRABBLE Deluxe Designer's Edition has style, taste and elegant accessories like a pastel rotating gameboard, pearlescent letter tiles and embroidered fabric pouch. All the fashionable game pieces are designed with a woman in mind, but with the same SCRABBLE challenge you know and love. Just choose 7 of the unique locking letter tiles, and start spelling - this Designer's Edition has a flair for F-U-N! Includes rotating gameboard with textured frame and raised letter grid, molded letter tiles that fit in place, 4 matching tile racks, zippered storage pouch, scorepad, pencil and instructions.
The Monopoly game comes packaged like a jewelry box. Meanwhile, at a more aesthetically progressive Target store, a temporary price cut on "Boys' Toys," also known as the Lego corner.
Thanks to Gwen and Abby over at Sociological Images: Seeing is Believing, where there is an interesting comment thread for this post. As one person observes, the pink Ouija board box looks at first glance like packaging for "feminine hygiene products." And yes, that spinner on the game of LIFE does look like a packet of birth control pills.
Eeeew again. I just found yet another version of pink Scrabble, this time as a "worthy partnership" for the cure for breast cancer. "Every word counts towards breast cancer awareness." I won't even comment on that.
I couldn't recall playing the disturbin' game "Mystery Date" as a kid, so I did a little search and came up with this Special 2008 Election edition of its 1960s television ad. (Kind of ironic that the first door should open to reveal John Edwards.)
.jpg)
.jpg)
7 comments:
When I saw the top of your post, at a glance I thought they were "feminine hygiene" products as well.
Thanks for this, and the link to the original post and comment thread. It's good to hear some outrage about something so outrageous.
When I saw this post, I got curious and Googled "pink poetry," and -- among other things -- came up with this and this.
Word verification is "slats". That thing is one goofy oracle sometimes.
I third the "feminine hygiene" confusion. I just want to also say I ran 10K for (against?) breast cancer on Saturday and the T-shirts we got say something like "Walk around the World for Breast Cancer" and a friend of mine who was also running refused to wear it - she said I'm not for breast cancer, I'm against it. She said we were sending the wrong message out into the universe and it might get taken seriously. And yes, the T-shirts were a rather ugly, nauseating pink. I'll bring mine back to Bloomington with me and you can see it for yourself!
Thanks, hfbt: good to hear from the Scrabble Queen herself on this topic!I must ask, wouldn't you find it disconcerting to play Scrabble on that Pepto-Bismol pink board? Yes, save that t-shirt as a mixed(up) message memento: I agree with your friend.
Hey, E, check out this nifty bit of history courtesy of Eric Hanson's A Book of Ages:
---
[At age 23] Milton Bradley invents a board game called The Checkered Game of Life, 1860. Players try to reach Happy Old Age by landing on Honesty, Bravery, and Success, but often land on Idleness, Poverty, and Disgrace, leaving the game early by Ruin and Suicide. The reinvented Game of Life will be much sunnier in 1960.
---
I suppose that the pink version of Milton's original Game of Life would have had all the girls taking Prozac to prevent Ruin and Suicide.
LOL...I do like the idea of a "checkered Game of Life"...thanks for that!
Excellent post my friend. You know a lot of things useful and very helpful. Thanks for sharing this. It's good to hear some outrage about something so outrageous.
Post a Comment