American Girl LGBT doll gets targeted by One Million Moms
The socially conservative advocacy group, One Million Moms, has called for a boycott on an American Girl LGBT doll.
The group has set up a petition to boycott the doll for its storyline about 10-year old Kira Bailey from Michigan and her lesbian great aunts.
As of last count, the petition has around 24,800 signatures. Likewise, conservative parents have posted rants on social media platforms like YouTube and Amazon.
The story of an American Girl LGBT doll
Mattel, the American Girl toy company, had come out with a 2021 Girl of the Year doll with an accompanying story called “Kira Down Under.”
The story explains how Kira visited her great aunts operated an animal sanctuary in Australia, who were allowed to marry there in 2017 when marriage equality in that country was legalized.
The two aunts, Auntie Mamie and Auntie Linette, are likewise featured in the first episode of Kira’s Australian Adventure stop-motion episode on YouTube.
But in a Tiktok video last December, Boston doll collector Rebecca Nachman noted that with the doll’s release, “There was so much blatant homophobia in all these American Girl Facebook groups I’m in and it was horrific.”
There were also one-star Amazon book reviews for the book “Kira Down Under.” One said, “The storyline is inappropriate and far too mature for young readers.”
Another review said: “Homosexuality is an inappropriate topic for a children’s book and I am very disappointed that it was woven so blatantly into the storyline for Kira.”
Who are the One Million Moms?
Founded by the American Family Association (AFA), which had been designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, the One Million Moms is fronted by Monica Cole.
Previously, One Million Moms had targeted the limited-edition rainbow Oreos, the Hallmark Channel for a lesbian couple ad, the Pixar movie “Onward,” and a Super Bowl ad that featured drag queens. It had also targeted Clifford the Big Red Dog.
In a post on their website, Cole had said: “Conservative parents are outraged! American Girl released its first doll with an accompanying book that has an LGBTQ storyline. This is unacceptable!”
She also said the story was “unacceptable” and said, “As Christians, we know that even though something is legalized doesn’t make it moral or right.”
Their petition has stated: “American Girl could have chosen another storyline or characters to write about and remained neutral in the culture war.”
“American Girl is attempting to desensitize our youth by featuring a storyline with two lesbian aunts,” they said.
Toy company stands by American Girl LGBT doll
However, Mattel isn’t backing down from their position in producing Kira.
“From the beginning, our ‘Girl of the Year’ characters have been designed to reflect girls’ lives today and the realities of the times,” American Girl spokesperson Julie Parks told Yahoo Life.
“As a brand, we’ve always strived to share the message that there’s no ‘magic recipe’ for a family and that families can be made up of all kinds of ingredients– and each is unique and lovely,” Parks said.
She added: “American Girl was built on a foundation of diversity and inclusion, and we remain committed to empowering the next generation of girls who will emerge as leaders who value empathy, equality and respect.”
American Girl was founded by Chicago teacher Pleasant Rowland in 1986 because of the lack of variety in dolls. Mattel acquired Pleasant Company in 1998 for US$700 million as a “perfect complement: to its Barbie brand,