On Wednesday, March 6, 2002, at 11:59 AM, Major Variola (ret) wrote: > Psyops starts young. > > http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/03/06/world/main503125.shtml > > One wonders how G.I. Joe sells in Iran? > > > AP) Iran has introduced its version of > Barbie and Ken: twin dolls Dara and > Sara, who promote traditional values > with their modest clothing and > pro-family stories.
A thought experiment: Buy a Ken doll. Dress it up to look like Osama bin Laden, complete with his sort of beard and his favorite armaments. To make it obvious at a glance, have some sort of "Death to America" slogan being held up in his hand. Maybe have him standing on top of the WTC rubble, or with the WTC towers behind him. Then take a photo of this Osama Doll and post it on a Web site, with suitable publicity. I'll bet Mattel, the makers of Ken and Barbie, have their shysters send a cease-and-desist order within days of learning of the site. This might make for an interesting constitutional test of current trends (*). (Where state attorneys general issue "warnings" to EBay to not be "disrespectful" to 911 victims, where publishers yank editorial cartoons under threat of lawsuits, and where the First Amendment seems to have been suspended in general.) Not being a shyster, but watching them from afar, I would say that Mattel would make some kind of claim that their reputation is being injured, or that their copyrights control how people can depict Ken dolls. There was a recent case involving a performance artist using Barbie and Ken dolls in, IIRC, bondage and discipline or other kinky positions. I don't recall the outcome. The defense I would use--aside from the "deep defense" of assassinating the lawyers and executives who filed the suit--would be to say that I *bought* the doll and, like millions of little girls and maybe little boys, will dress it as I damned well please. (I wonder if there's a shrink-wrap license included with each doll, limiting which clothes can be put on it?) --Tim May "Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice."--Barry Goldwater
