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A mister no more: Mr. Potato Head goes gender neutral


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2021 Feb 25, 10:47am   581 views  49 comments

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1   FortwayeAsFuckJoeBiden   2021 Feb 25, 11:31am  

Crazy shit that’s not challenged takes over. Democrats are pushing it, Republicans saying nothing... so it gets worse.
2   Eric Holder   2021 Feb 25, 1:23pm  

The Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head characters will live on in some form, Hasbro said, but didn't provide details. Both have appeared in the “Toy Story" movies.


I'm sure they will be edited out and replaced with two transgender yams.
3   Ceffer   2021 Feb 25, 1:27pm  

What are the mechanics of butt fucking a potato?
4   Eric Holder   2021 Feb 25, 1:55pm  

Ceffer says
What are the mechanics of butt fucking a potato?


Use your imagination:


5   Onvacation   2021 Feb 25, 1:59pm  

Talk about junk in the trunk.
6   Ceffer   2021 Feb 25, 5:52pm  

I'm not putting my pud in that spud.
7   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 25, 6:53pm  

I think it was a decent move. They didn't eliminate the Mr. and Mrs, but are branding all of the characters under the "Potato Head" universe with the Mr. and Mrs. relegated to the bottom of the label. It doesn't take away anything, while opening up broader contexts the character can be played within, and more importantly, marketed to. This is the natural evolution of brands, not unlike Doritos introducing Cool Ranch and eventually a plethora of often weird new flavors. Unlike introducing new flavors and perhaps retiring others, what Hasbro did here is more analogous to rebranding all the flavors as DORITOS and moving the names of the different flavors to the bottom of the package, while not changing the formula or flavor lineup at all. All parents can play with it with their kids, whether traditional or progressive. Why can't people just do that instead of pitching a bitch that it no longer exclusively highlights their personally preferred gender roles? It's a freaking toy FFS.
8   Patrick   2021 Feb 25, 6:55pm  

I remember as a kid that the originals were just pokey pieces you would push into an actual potato.

Maybe the spikes were 1/2", but no doubt it was still considered too much of a legal liability, so they went to all plastic.


9   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 25, 7:20pm  

Patrick says
no doubt it was still considered too much of a legal liability


I'm old enough to have played with the OG toy too. IIRC the change was more about food waste during a period of inflation and shortages, even if that was the virtue signal over the safety/liability concern. Never mind that as potato sack size increases the chances of finding ones you wouldn't miss in the kitchen exceeds one.

The plastic version's big disappointment was, you're limited to choosing the clock position and location of each piece in a predetermined set of holes. I remember some real Van Gogh shit going down in the pre-K days with a real tabula rasa potato.
10   Ceffer   2021 Feb 25, 7:24pm  

Do potato head dolls regard french fries as cannibal anarchy? Inquiring minds need to know.
11   HeadSet   2021 Feb 26, 5:49am  

Automan Empire says
All parents can play with it with their kids, whether traditional or progressive.


Virtue signal much? The "potato head" was already whatever you wanted it to be. It can already be "gender neutral" or even hermaphrodite by mixing Mr and Mrs parts. You could also make it handicapped with one eye or missing/broken limbs. The "gender neutral" marketing is just a ploy to catch the perceived bandwagon. And why no slanted eyes pieces or Afro hair? Must be racists.
12   zzyzzx   2021 Feb 26, 5:58am  

HONK HONK!!!
13   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 8:45am  

HeadSet says
The "gender neutral" marketing is just a ploy to catch the perceived bandwagon


This is a good example of "To those accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression."

Seriously, HOW does one reach a state of mind where enjoyment of a toy is a zero sum game, where expanding the potential customer base without taking anything from the product somehow diminishes or takes away your ability to enjoy it yourself?

Dude, this is a YOU problem.
14   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 9:34am  

Automan Empire says
Seriously, HOW does one reach a state of mind where enjoyment of a toy is a zero sum game, where expanding the potential customer base without taking anything from the product somehow diminishes or takes away your ability to enjoy it yourself?


This isn't what @HeadSet is doing - you're creating a stawman and I think you're aware of it.
15   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 11:09am  

richwicks says

This isn't what @HeadSet is doing


He's free to defend his point of view if he so chooses. Like arguing with a woman, right wingers tend to change the subject rather than be held accountable to literally anything they say on topics like these. Just once I'd like to hear an explanation for this POV that conservatives are being actively oppressed and marginalized by "culture wars" and simultaneously wishing the faggots would just oppress and marginalize themselves back in the closet so conservatives aren't inconvenienced by their mere existence.

When the word "Deplorables" was used, it wasn't referring to all 50% of the American population that identifies as conservative. It was referring to this SPECIFIC type of conservative.
16   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 11:26am  

Automan Empire says
Just once I'd like to hear an explanation for this POV that conservatives are being actively oppressed and marginalized by "culture wars"

Insurrection, need I say more?
Automan Empire says
simultaneously wishing the faggots would just oppress and marginalize themselves back in the closet so conservatives aren't inconvenienced by their mere existence.

What have you got against fags?
17   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 11:31am  

Onvacation says

What have you got against fags?


Don't play slow and stupid with me here.
18   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 11:38am  

Automan Empire says
When the word "Deplorables" was used, it wasn't referring to all 50% of the American population that identifies as conservative. It was referring to this SPECIFIC type of conservative.


Yeah, anybody that opposes war and realizes their government is run and controlled by criminals.

Those are the "deplorables".
19   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 11:39am  

Automan Empire says
Don't play slow and stupid with me here.

Stop being prejudiced.
20   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 11:55am  

Onvacation says
Stop being prejudiced.


You're not even who I asked. DARVO is no better than slow and stupid. I think this topic-hopping game is a surrogate indicator that you can't even face your own POV internally without cognitive dissonance, much less defend it to someone else who doesn't already agree and share it with you.
21   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 12:13pm  

Automan Empire says
He's free to defend his point of view if he so chooses. Like arguing with a woman, right wingers tend to change the subject rather than be held accountable to literally


Look, in my opinion you're just pushing for an argument - you don't have any interest in understanding.

I consider it very childish to engage in an argument simply to "win". If you want to understand a person's actual point of view and challenge your own in the process, you have a discussion - you don't engage in strawman BS.

Mr and Mrs Potato Head have ALWAYS had interchangeable parts, so having a company pander to to the TINY minority of "non binaries" is nothing more than virtual signalling BS and some free marketing as our "news" discusses this "who gives a crap" virtue signalling position from a company that makes a toy that adults have vague memories of, but children have in the vast majority of cases never heard of.

Pretty soon companies will be announcing that teddy bears and stuffed toys are "gender neutral" - really? No vagina's and tits on a stuffed toy? What a new concept but I guarantee it's coming.
22   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 12:56pm  

richwicks says
you're just pushing for an argument - you don't have any interest in understanding.


Dude, the entire conversation is in writing above. I explained my position on the topic in post 7, refuted the claim made in the OP, and challenged those who dislike the change to dig deeply for their reasons why and address them without deflection. Your response here reminds me of my erstwhile best friend's (cunt of a) wife, whose response to literally any difference of opinion was, "You're being negative! Stop being negative!"

richwicks says
some free marketing


That's exactly what it is, as I stated already. Marketing and capitalism working as intended. Except the topic appears to squick you out enough that you find routine marketing techniques problematic all of a sudden.

What does any heterosexual, binary, cisgendered person lose from this change of packaging? That is the question I raised and predicted difficulty getting a straight answer to.
23   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 1:09pm  

Automan Empire says
That's exactly what it is, as I stated already. Marketing and capitalism working as intended. Except the topic appears to squick you out enough that you find routine marketing techniques problematic all of a sudden.


These are not "routine marketing techniques".

Automan Empire says
What does any heterosexual, binary, cisgendered person lose from this change of packaging?


They don't care.

People are just tired of being beaten over the head with the "progressive agenda". Basically the company is trying to appeal to a insignificant minority, where the VAST majority are just rolling their eyes. The next step when sales stay stagnant or even crater will be to call anybody that won't buy their dumb product a racist, a sexist, a this a that. For years people have put up with this and are tired of it.

GhostBusters 2016 could have been the best movie ever made, but I certainly wasn't going to give them any money when ALL criticism of the film was that a bunch of man babies were upset it had women in the lead. People are just tired of being cajoled and nagged to purchase inferior products and then denounced when people refuse to fork over their money. Now it's Playskool doing it.

People get fed up with this, and simply boycott it. This is why NFL viewship has cratered, why films are becoming less profitable, why entire franchises are dying. What they are selling people don't want to buy.
24   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 1:28pm  

richwicks says
These are not "routine marketing techniques".


OMG, you actually ARE resorting to denying basic bread and butter branding and marketing techniques to avoid the topic.

richwicks says
They don't care.


Followed by "3 paragraphs shaking out a gunny sack of complaints about different topics and strawman predictions" worth of not-caring.

All to dodge the question, what does anyone actually lose here?
25   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 1:30pm  

richwicks says
People are just tired


Exactly why I proposed grave dancing after Rush Limbaugh's death. This was one of his main tools to sell his POV, and Snapple, to his conservative audience.

I remember when political discourse was different and better before him.
26   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 1:44pm  

Automan Empire says
All to dodge the question, what does anyone actually lose here?


Here, let me put it this way:

Who cares?

Let's move on to the next faux artificially constructed "outrage" nobody gives a damned about.
27   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 2:24pm  

richwicks says
Who cares?

Let's move on to the next faux artificially constructed "outrage" nobody gives a damned about.


OK, so are you wrapping up this conservative-initiated discussion by actually conceding that the Mr. Potato Head label is NOT a worthy topic of discussion and that even starting this thread was a waste of time over a non-issue?

Or are you playing that game of pretending (within this conservative initiated thread) that conservatives never cared about this, and plan to mind-wipe this entire discussion yet pick right back up the next time one of these conservative trigger topics ropes you all in again?
28   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 3:04pm  

Automan Empire says
OK, so are you wrapping up this conservative-initiated discussion by actually conceding that the Mr. Potato Head label is NOT a worthy topic of discussion and that even starting this thread was a waste of time over a non-issue?


Xir Potato Head isn't worthy of discussion.

The motivation about making Xir Potato Head is worthy of discussion - for some.

The concept of a non binary POTATO was entirely foreign just 5 years ago. No company would have been promoting this stupidity, and after 4 years of it, it's rather exhausting and eye rolling.

Automan Empire says
Or are you playing that game of pretending (within this conservative initiated thread) that conservatives never cared about this


Conservative/liberal are just words. They don't contain any ideology or principles at all.

There's correct and incorrect, and if rationale for a policy is useful or detrimental. Nothing else.

I don't give a damned what Playskool does, but it does raise the question why corporations are potentially alienating over 99% of their population with this endless rhetoric and beating people over the head of it.

I always buy toys for Toys For Tots in Christ-my-ass, but I'm not going to search out toys from virtue signalling corporations that are falling victim to what is me, obvious and relentless propaganda. I'm tired of this shit. I don't know what the end game is, but considering our government keeps bailing out failed corporations, and I don't think this junk is actually coming from a free market economy. I'm tired of my government's bullshit. I'm tired of living in a top down centralized economy and constant unrelenting bullshit propaganda that seems to have no purpose other to promote bizarre niche concepts with people's tax money. I'm just sick of it. Nearly everybody is.
29   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 3:42pm  

richwicks says
I'm just sick of it. Nearly everybody is.


Not everybody, just some conservatives. This is a position you never reasoned yourself into, which is why your arguments keep coming down to your emotions, rather than rational reasons, or straight answers to simple questions, like:

*What does anyone LOSE by changing the label on Potato Head products?*

If there ACTUALLY WAS some kind of boot on conservative necks, you'd be more keen to drill down and identify it, and I'd be an ally helping to remove it. The problem I have here is there IS no boot, at least not the one you reflexively point to which is a hollow abstraction just like the War on Drugs and the War on Terror. From my perspective, you're mad that a boot is being removed from the neck of a class you consider "the other" and find a convenient abstract scapegoat that relieves you of the responsibility of actually seeking out and confronting your true oppressors.
30   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 3:50pm  

Automan Empire says
I think this topic-hopping game is a surrogate indicator that you can't even face your own POV internally without cognitive dissonance

You got that right.

Can you handle the cognitive dissonance of cancel culture?
31   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 3:53pm  

Automan Empire says
What does any heterosexual, binary, cisgendered person lose from this change of packaging? That is the question I raised and predicted difficulty getting a straight answer to.

Because it's a lgbqtxyz topic.
32   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 4:02pm  

Automan Empire says
Mr. Potato Head label is NOT a worthy topic of discussion and that even starting this thread was a waste of time over a non-issue?

Just another example of deviance being normalized.
33   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 4:12pm  

Automan Empire says
From my perspective, you're mad that a boot is being removed from the neck of a class you consider "the other" and find a convenient abstract scapegoat that relieves you of the responsibility of actually seeking out and confronting your true oppressors.

From my perspective that boot is getting heavier.

They want us to argue over trivia like "gender"and politics, while not noticing that the latest war on "the invisible enemy" has united the governments around the world in oppression of their populations. The first amendment has been suspended for almost a year now.

We got problems and mr. Potato Head's sexuality is not one of them.
34   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 4:14pm  

Automan Empire says
Not everybody, just some conservatives. This is a position you never reasoned yourself into, which is why your arguments keep coming down to your emotions, rather than rational reasons


Rationale like there are non binary genders?

There's intersex conditions, but they are incredibly rare. This is a biological condition.

Automan Empire says
If there ACTUALLY WAS some kind of boot on conservative necks


When have I ever mentioned that? When have I point pointed to "a boot on conservative necks"?

Again, I think you are trying to win an argument, not to engage in a discussion. This is yet another strawman.

I don't think you're honestly trying to understand what you perceive to be "the other side", you are simply trying to create an argument "to win".

If you want my honest opinion, my brutally honest opinion, I don't care if parents marshal their kid into sterility. They are just terminating their gene progression. It's nothing more than a form of eugenics to me, a soft form. I won't advocate for it, but I won't resist it either.

Want to push to sterilize your kids? Go ahead.

Automan Empire says
From my perspective, you're mad that a boot is being removed from the neck of a class you consider "the other"


I am simply indifferent to what YOU have called "the other".

When I'm at work, the only consideration I have is about the quality of work they produce, I don't care if they are a man, a woman, a transgender, a non-binary, a cross dresser, a catholic, a Scientologist, a furry - I don't care. Do your fucking job, that's it. I'm an adult.
35   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 4:29pm  

Onvacation says
Can you handle the cognitive dissonance of cancel culture?


Are you for or against Cancel Culture? Because this thread is a right wing example of it, in case you missed this.
36   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 4:32pm  

Automan Empire says
Are you for or against Cancel Culture?

Against. I am for free speech.

What about you? For or against the culture of cancel?
37   Onvacation   2021 Feb 26, 4:33pm  

Automan Empire says
Because this thread is a right wing example of it, in case you missed this.

How so? Who's being canceled?
38   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 4:42pm  

richwicks says
When have I ever mentioned that? When have I point pointed to "a boot on conservative necks"?


You're not the only person in this thread, and my position is not invalidated by not 100% matching the exact nuances of yours. One can't pretend that's not an element of every thread conservatives spawn over LGBT issues. Meanwhile you dodge the question:

What does anyone LOSE by changing the label on Potato Head? Only answer in the thread is this non sequitur:
Onvacation says
Because it's a lgbqtxyz topic.
39   richwicks   2021 Feb 26, 4:50pm  

Automan Empire says
richwicks says
When have I ever mentioned that? When have I point pointed to "a boot on conservative necks"?


You're not the only person in this thread, and my position is not invalidated by not 100% matching the exact nuances of yours. One can't pretend that's not an element of every thread conservatives spawn


Stop talking about conservatives. I've already pointed out that it's a distraction.

It's correct versus incorrect. Are there more than 2 sexes? Maybe at most 3 - male, female, and infertile.

This is just biology. For whatever reason, an animal that cannot physically reproduce, they are intersex. A eunuch you can very well consider intersex.

You are arguing about semantics, all I care about is biology. Semantics has no place in science. None at all, it's a creation of a changing language which is being deformed now.

Automan Empire says

What does anyone LOSE by changing the label on Potato Head?


We'll see if Playskool does. I don't care if a business makes an incorrect decision, but I do care if they are getting a taxpayer bailout to push an agenda.

In the last "covid" stimulus bill $1,200 was the maximum an individual could receive in "stimulus". Well, there's 330 million Americans, and if ALL of them received the maximum that would be 396 billion dollars. Our national debt went up by 5 trillion in the last "stimulus" - where did the other 4.5 trillion dollars go to? This information isn't accessible, and I don't think that if we were in a free market economic system, there would be pandering to less than 1% of the population.

My conclusion is this is an economic decision from Playskool, but not to appeal to the purchasing public, but to appeal to the people bailing them out.

Is this logically incoherent?
40   Automan Empire   2021 Feb 26, 4:52pm  

Onvacation says
How so? Who's being canceled?


Slow and stupid is no way to go through life, son. Nothing is being taken from conservatives, yet right here in this thread:

richwicks says
People get fed up with this, and simply boycott it. This is why NFL viewship has cratered, why films are becoming less profitable, why entire franchises are dying. What they are selling people don't want to buy.

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