“Up In Arms Over Guns In Toyland”

Last week I posted a newspaper article in which the Rambo action figures of the eighties were presented as Coleco’s newest line. The violent movies being brought to toy boxes across the U.S. was a far from popular move, and today I want to direct your attention to the April/May, 1986 issue of Mother Jones Magazine which also takes aim at Coleco’s Rambo toys . . . and unsurprisingly has less-than-pleasant things to say about the merger of toys and cartoons.

“The explosion in war toy sales–which have, along with the rest of the toy industry, nearly doubled over the past five years–nonetheless spurred a flurry of parental protest during the holiday-buying season, with grassroots groups organizing educational leafleting at toy stores and boycotts of companies that sell action figures.”

Related articles

• 1987 Starcom Newspaper Advertisement (battlegrip.com)
• Spotted Online – 5 Suggestions for Fixing the Toy Industry (battlegrip.com)
• 1996 McFarlane Toys’ Concept to Completion (battlegrip.com)