Islam is the light
Click to hear message
Here’s the deal. My publisher picked up a rather unremarkable doll for one of her kids. The thing got played with for a while and then disappeared into the heap of other toys like *dolls tend to do.
*I’ve always thought dolls were creepy because of this way they have of blending into the backdrop of a home. They inhabit closets and toy boxes, basements and attics and how do you know they’re not silently communicating with one another and planning a revolt?
But I digress. The publisher caught a news item about a doll that apparently speaks of its adoration for Islam and which, of course, is outraging parents everywhere. She went looking for that anonymous doll in the heap and sure enough, amid the coos and little baby cries, the doll informs whomever is listening that “Islam is the light.”
I find it sinister for reasons that have nothing to do with religious preferences. Trying to sneak subliminal messages into a child’s head just smacks of evil. What if the message instead said “kill mommy?” or “poke holes in daddy’s rubbers?”
The doll is shown in the photo speaking its beliefs into my ear. Click on the image to see a demonstration. Could it work? Could a barely audible murmured message sink into a child’s gray matter and alter his or her spiritual development?
Beats the hell out of me and I don’t have time to think of it. I have to go figure out which way is east so I can pray.
October 29th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
These Chinese-made toys. They’re just not dependable. It was suposed to say – “It’s not nice to bite.”
Subliminal messages? Isn’t that a code-word for school? You know, that place where kids are taught what to think.
October 30th, 2008 at 12:02 am
If you listen to it too many times, it starts to sound like: “It’s a mad delight.” Which of course leads to the philosophical question: “What?”