Another Poor Watchdog Argument

According to a story on Wired's Game | Life blog, yet another watchdog group is making yet another poorly reasoned argument about kids being corrupted by games. This time they've chosen to focus on the Traveler's Tales Lego series, specifically Lego Batman. What harm could possibly be done by a game less violent than most anything a child could watch on Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon (even during the day)? Let's let the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood educate us:

"How do you turn the ultimate creative toy into a symbol of commercialized childhood? Begin by partnering with media companies to sell that toy in branded kits designed for recreating movies like Star Wars, rather than creative construction. Then, dispense with hands-on building altogether by turning your toy into a video game so that instead of deciding what to build next, children choose which cyber weapons to use to beat up their opponent. Finally, ignore the fact it was rated suitable for ages 10 & up and partner with McDonald’s for a Happy Meal toy giveaway to simultaneously promote the video game, junk food, and the violent Dark Knight movie series to preschoolers."

Now before I make my argument, I suggest you take a trip over to the group's TODAY Awards page from which the above text was taken. The descriptions of all of their nominees for this award for worst toy of the year (or whatever--to be honest, I don't care enough about the distinction to look at their page again) suggest that this is not your typical concerned soccer moms group. Rather, all of their blurbs feature the tone (and common fallacies) of reactionary groups like Greenpeace--the ones who try to cover their backward-thinking agendas with the guise of progressivism, promoting blind anti-corporatism and generally throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Now, let's dissect their argument for why Lego Batman will ruin the future of any child unfortunate enough to come into contact with it.

How do you turn the ultimate creative toy into a symbol of commercialized childhood? Begin by partnering with media companies to sell that toy in branded kits designed for recreating movies like Star Wars, rather than creative construction.

This claim is wrong on so many levels, it's tough to know where to begin, so I'll try to just take things in order. First of all, calling Legos "the ultimate creative toy" is the kind of hyperbole that gives you good reason to be skeptical of any claim that follows. But what really irks me here is the total lack of understanding of how creativity typically develops. As a former art student and graphic designer myself, I like to think that I know a thing or two about being creative. One of those things is that people who make claims like the above probably are not particularly creative themselves. If they were, they would realize that creativity can't be expressed without a certain level of technical skill. A very common way that budding artists develop that technical skill is by copying other artists. It's the same reason computer geniuses often start out by taking apart pieces of technology that interest them. All the imagination in the world is useless if you don't know how to objectify what you've imagined. I would say that building replica X-Wing fighters is just as valid a way to learn that technical skill as building replica police boats, fire trucks, or medieval castles.

The other problem here is the assumption that what every kid who picks up a lego block wants to do is unleash her unique imagination on the world. Some kids just want to build the Deathstar, just like some teens learn the basics of creative writing because they want to write Sonic the Hedgehog slashfics. And this is why these faux-progressive groups irritate me so much: they pretend that they're trying to liberate kids from the oppressive influence of corporations while putting strict limits on what counts as acceptable behavior. In other words, their actual interest isn't freedom, it's promoting their own values as the only viable ones.

Then, dispense with hands-on building altogether by turning your toy into a video game so that instead of deciding what to build next, children choose which cyber weapons to use to beat up their opponent.

This is the only remotely true bit of the above blurb, but even still it is not entirely true. Now I'll admit that I have not played Lego Batman, but a cursory glance at Youtube and a couple of reviews showed that, while the gameplay does seem to focus on (the tamest imaginable) violence, there are some puzzles which involve building things with Legos. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that, like many of these watchdog groups, nobody at the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood has actually played any of the iterations of Lego Batman, and that what is being criticized is the concept. And I would actually let that pass--if I got the impression they had done what I did, and taken ten minutes to watch a couple of videos and read a couple of reviews. But as we shall see from their last statement, truth is not the issue here...

Finally, ignore the fact it was rated suitable for ages 10 & up and partner with McDonald’s for a Happy Meal toy giveaway to simultaneously promote the video game, junk food, and the violent Dark Knight movie series to preschoolers.

Ah, now we get to the heart of the matter. The real issue here is not that "the ultimate creative toy" has been made into a fighting-centric video game, but that the great Satan, McDonalds, is somehow profiting from it. Decrying exploitation of children is one thing, but to assert that playing a Batman game is going to somehow result in preschoolers driving themselves to McDonalds for a Happy Meal and then going to a screening of The Dark Knight Returns is almost too absurd to acknowledge. Where are the parents in all this? Why are they not saying "no" to the kids who are screaming for Happy Meals? Why are they not explaining to kids that some movies are for adults only? Why is this group not encouraging parents to have a dialog with their children to foster mutual understanding? The reason is that their goal is not to empower parents with information (if you want to see what that looks like, visit the great website What They Play), but to push their anti-corporate agenda. I could point out that, in its own way, this is an example of exploiting children, even if the end it ideological rather than financial. But that would be too easy.

I have to say, of all the watchdog groups who have targeted video games, Campaign for a Commerical Free Childhood is the most odious I have taken the time to look into. I hesitate to reveal my own politics in this blog because they're generally irrelevant, but let's just say I consider myself anything but conservative. However, I think that groups like this that blindly lash out at all of the corporate boogeymen of the reactionary left, label as "commercial" any form of serialized entertainment, and promote technophobia and anti-corporate fear-mongering rather than education, empowerment and parental responsibility sicken me. If you don't want your children to eat at McDonalds, fine--there are sound arguments for why they shouldn't (though they have to do with health, not evil Happy Meal toys). If you don't want them to play violent video games or watch violent movies, fine; again, there well-reasoned arguments to be made, and since every child is different, it's a decision every parent has to make for himself or herself. But to say a child shouldn't be allowed to enjoy Legos or Batman because McDonalds might turn a profit off of it is the kind of irrational thinking that, when used by parents, can do a lot more harm to kids than a video game.