Toy Depicts 9/11 Attack

Published on August 28th, 2004

plane
KIDS TOY Mocks 9/11 Attack. I honestly suspect that this wasn’t intentional since the other toys had all sorts of other objects besides an airplane between the buildings. I’m sure people will now be trying to collect these. Keep an eye on eBAY.

6 users responded in " Toy Depicts 9/11 Attack "

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# 1 Mike Voice said, on August 28th, 2004 at 12:27 pm

I’m also curious as what “intentional” means, in this case.

Is it meant in a mean-spirited way?

Or is it a form of commemoration (just prior to the 3rd anniversary) for an event that got world-wide coverage?

Where was the toy made? A friendly country, or a hostile one?

When I initially read the headline (at Wired) I thought the toy was going to show flames/explosions – the plane partially-embedded in the building.

I think the pictured toy is too “tame” to be considered an outrage.

# 2 Mike Voice said, on August 28th, 2004 at 6:17 pm

The way the Wired note starts: “Small figurines of an airplane crashing into the World Trade Center were packed inside more than 14,000 bags of candy and sent to small U.S. groceries.” (emphasis is mine).

To me, the picture doesn’t show a plane “crashing into” anything.

# 3 K B said, on August 28th, 2004 at 7:56 pm

I’m somewhat prone to play devil’s advocate here. I’m not even convinced that the toy represents the twin towers. An American sees the toy and says, “Ah ha!” but a foreign cheap toy maker might just be placing an airplane in the sky, for which he needs a couple of buildings.

If it seems a stretch to imagine that people are reading into it, consider this from the article: “There is no mistaking what the toys represent: At the bottom of each is the product number 9011.” This does not compute: that would make the product number 911, or 0911, but not 9011.

# 4 John C. Dvorak said, on August 28th, 2004 at 11:26 pm

It’s actually a a baby’s toy and the kid whacks the plane and it spins around. I agree…this is bullshit over-sensitivity.

# 5 Jim Dermitt said, on August 29th, 2004 at 5:02 am

There was a time when the toys were made in the USA. I’m thinking Erector, Lionel, Barbie etc. That was when American toy makers were millionaires. Now all this junk is imported. If this imported junk is collectible, the toy collecting hobby could be in trouble down the road. I guess today many of the millionaires are importers and all we know how to make is trouble. The new toys are made for kids, by kids in some hell hole sweatshop God knows where. The junk trinkets these idiots were packing into supermarket gumball machines for fifty cents were full of lead. Hundreds of millions were sold across the USA. It’s like we are becoming junk nation via the developing world. U.S. Corporations outsource more jobs and we get back crappy toys and lead trinkets in gumball machines. What a deal! Maybe it’s a global toys for food program or something that’s making and distributing this junk. You’d think they would be growing rice or corn instead of wasting time constructing junk toys for the U.S. market. We can make our own toys and make them better. Is there a big junk toy lobby in Washington now?

# 6 Mike Voice said, on August 29th, 2004 at 9:15 am

I think the word I was looking for, in earlier posts, was “projection” or “projecting”.

Exhibit A: “”There is no mistaking what the toys represent:…”

I think some adults are projecting there own internal #$%# onto a simple kids toy. Somehow, kids are going to see this toy and be traumatized by… what? A toy plane, that spins on a wire, between two toy buildings.

I was discussing this with some co-workers, after I printed a couple of the web-based stories at work, and one mentioned a recent GM corvette ad – showing two Corvettes being launched toward each other, with a city (NYC?) backdrop. And people complained – so the ad was pulled. (my wife & I don’t watch TV, so I haven’t seen the ad).

It made me think of the 1st Spiderman movie’s preview – showing Spiderman catching the helicopter in a web between the WTC’s towers – which then had to be pulled – since showing the towers intact was painful to people.

We are constantly barraged with messages about the importance of “9/11″: how it changed the world, justifies everything we have done since, yada yada yada. We are supposed to remember it, and be swayed by it’s use in rhetoric, but not any of the specifics of it.

Well, not any of the negative specifics – just the heroism of certain groups – fire/police/transit at the scene, passengers fighting hijackers, etc.

How long until all “we” remember is “Terrorists attacked America”? And, we’re not sure what year that was?

Like most history – it is being packaged and sanitized, for our protection.

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