This week we learned that changing our Facebook photo to a picture of Tweety Bird doesn’t fight child abuse or promote pedophilia, two questions we might never have pondered if we used our time more productively. Who thinks up these things?
One minute everyone is all warm and fuzzy, laughing at friends who portrayed themselves as Elmer Fudd, Sweet Polly Purebred or (extra credit here) Lance Crossfire, and the next minute a quarrel breaks out over something called “slacktivism,” which in this case means calling attention to yourself in the guise of raising awareness of a nobler cause. If you really want to fight child abuse, then write a check, Bozo.
This rumble was interrupted by the much darker claim that the cartoon character thing was started by a cabal of pedophiles to entice children to accept “friend” requests from strangers. We were still trying to figure out how that was supposed to work when the online rumor busters at snopes.com pronounced it false. Snopes’ sleuths reported that they received almost 700 queries on the subject in just a few hours on Sunday.
Which brings us to Video Girl Barbie, a digital camcorder disguised as a 12-inch fashion doll. With a AAA battery in each thigh, an LCD screen on her back and a lens embedded above her plastic cleavage, she was identified as “a possible child pornography production method” in an FBI cyber crime alert leaked to a Seattle news station. Next thing you know, the Pedophilia Barbie story is all over the Web. Gotta raise awareness, you know.
Toymaker Mattel quickly pointed out — and the FBI confirmed — that the doll hasn’t been linked to any crimes. Zero.
The point was to advise cops not to overlook a potential source of evidence if, for example, a Video Girl Barbie turned up in a search of a suspected predator’s home. It was not meant to suggest that cyber creepers could spy on your kids through the peephole in Barbie’s chest.
So go ahead and shell out the $49.99, if watching digital images of Ken’s plastic pecs with your 6-year-old is your idea of fun. And relax. What happens in the Dream House stays in the Dream House.
