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Disney: “Gendered stereotypes are harmful — be more inclusive!” Also Disney: “Tell us your gender so we can target ads based on that!” I would take DIE advoca

Disney: “Gendered stereotypes are harmful — be more inclusive!” Also Disney: “Tell us your gender so we can target ads based on that!” I would take DIE advocates more seriously if they reformed themselves — rather than lecturing the rest of us while engaging in such blatant hypocrisy.

sublinear 4y ago
It's called "cultural Marxism". It's not necessarily a conspiracy, but it's certainly a thing. DEI is just the latest consultant scheme.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- 1attice 4y ago
  What I love about nonsense phrases like 'cultural marxism' is that they invariably have the opposite impact than was likely intended. Calling "cultural marxism" on [checks notes] a *marketing ask* is like calling a restaurant a food bank because they both involve food.
  - sublinear 4y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory Hah. Ok fine let's call it by the more academic term. It's still a thing and nothing was refuted by your comment.
rsynnott 4y ago
I have dim memories of lego positioning their stuff as gender-neutral when I was a kid. That went comprehensively out the window in the mid-90s or so, presumably when some lego marketer discovered the (dubious) joys of market segmentation.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  What is or isn't gender-neutral is quite subjective. Pink lego sets about princesses and ponies may seem quite gendered, but what about a fire truck set? Lego City, Castle and Space each started out in the late 70s. Where those gendered? Perhaps not as overtly gendered as pink princess stuff, but nevertheless I bet they sold more of those sets to boys than girls. To Lego's credit, they did seem to make a point of putting both girls and boys on their advertisements.
  - smoldesu 4y ago
    I didn't really mind it because when you mixed them up in a tupperware bin there was no "girl set" or "boy set", just a mess of Legos. Plus, like you said, there was a glut of gender-independent sets that were frankly pretty awesome. It doesn't matter if you're a boy, girl, or otherwise - you want to build that $399 Death Star kit if it's the last thing you do.
- pyuser583 4y ago
  Yeah I was raised during the first (second?) gender neutral parenting fad. Marketing is what killed it. Boys followed “He-Man” and girls “She-Ra”. Come to think of it, those are the most heavily gendered characters in existence. Look at their freaking names!
  - shadowgovt 4y ago
    it's a bit of a spiral. Marketing was responding to toy stores gendering the aisles; can't get on the shelf if the store doesn't know where to put your product. I'm not sure what stores were responding to. Possibly the public.
  - autoexec 4y ago
    He-Man wasn't any more targeted at boys than Transformers was. She-Ra was the most overtly gendered (being a "girl version" of an existing show) but it wasn't any more targeted at girls than My Little Pony was. Many cartoons in the 80s were just ads selling toys that were intended to be sold in either the blue aisle or the pink aisle. Growing up I watched both He-man and She-Ra, in fact I thought She-Ra was the better show since it had a somewhat darker tone than He-Man did, but I didn't know any boys who owned She-Ra toys. Jem and the Holograms was supposed to sell fashion dolls sold in the pink aisle (competing with Barbie), but the show itself was specifically written with lots of action to keep boys interested so they wouldn't change the channel and prevent their sisters from watching.

sublinear 4y ago

It's called "cultural Marxism". It's not necessarily a conspiracy, but it's certainly a thing. DEI is just the latest consultant scheme.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
1attice 4y ago
What I love about nonsense phrases like 'cultural marxism' is that they invariably have the opposite impact than was likely intended. Calling "cultural marxism" on [checks notes] a *marketing ask* is like calling a restaurant a food bank because they both involve food.
- sublinear 4y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory Hah. Ok fine let's call it by the more academic term. It's still a thing and nothing was refuted by your comment.

rsynnott 4y ago

I have dim memories of lego positioning their stuff as gender-neutral when I was a kid. That went comprehensively out the window in the mid-90s or so, presumably when some lego marketer discovered the (dubious) joys of market segmentation.

MichaelCollins 4y ago
What is or isn't gender-neutral is quite subjective. Pink lego sets about princesses and ponies may seem quite gendered, but what about a fire truck set? Lego City, Castle and Space each started out in the late 70s. Where those gendered? Perhaps not as overtly gendered as pink princess stuff, but nevertheless I bet they sold more of those sets to boys than girls. To Lego's credit, they did seem to make a point of putting both girls and boys on their advertisements.
- smoldesu 4y ago
  I didn't really mind it because when you mixed them up in a tupperware bin there was no "girl set" or "boy set", just a mess of Legos. Plus, like you said, there was a glut of gender-independent sets that were frankly pretty awesome. It doesn't matter if you're a boy, girl, or otherwise - you want to build that $399 Death Star kit if it's the last thing you do.
pyuser583 4y ago
Yeah I was raised during the first (second?) gender neutral parenting fad. Marketing is what killed it. Boys followed “He-Man” and girls “She-Ra”. Come to think of it, those are the most heavily gendered characters in existence. Look at their freaking names!
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  it's a bit of a spiral. Marketing was responding to toy stores gendering the aisles; can't get on the shelf if the store doesn't know where to put your product. I'm not sure what stores were responding to. Possibly the public.
- autoexec 4y ago
  He-Man wasn't any more targeted at boys than Transformers was. She-Ra was the most overtly gendered (being a "girl version" of an existing show) but it wasn't any more targeted at girls than My Little Pony was. Many cartoons in the 80s were just ads selling toys that were intended to be sold in either the blue aisle or the pink aisle. Growing up I watched both He-man and She-Ra, in fact I thought She-Ra was the better show since it had a somewhat darker tone than He-Man did, but I didn't know any boys who owned She-Ra toys. Jem and the Holograms was supposed to sell fashion dolls sold in the pink aisle (competing with Barbie), but the show itself was specifically written with lots of action to keep boys interested so they wouldn't change the channel and prevent their sisters from watching.