Reprogramming Our Youth, One Child's Toychest at a Time

Karen Hall's essay, "False Witness: Combat Entertainment and Citizen Training in the United States" asserts several views about both the movie industry and its portrayal of the military as well as the brainwashing effect that military toys can have on children.

I tend to agree with her main points on the issue of movies and their effect on the opinion of the military in the minds of American citizens. The trauma of war can be such a horrific experience, many soldiers never wish to relive it. This leaves the public with a very narrow view of warfare; not to mention a commercialized one. Hall also delves into the psychological aspect of what she calls "false witness." Many war movies justify unfair and cruel acts on the enemy by portraying them as acts of revenge.

I think Hall touches on an important observation of the relationship between movies and reality. The trauma of watching a close friend or comrade get killed calls for closure and openness. But movies always show the soldiers suppress any semblance of such feelings, instead rallying to a cry for revenge and retaliation.

And all these movies which set up our nation's war story and control our opinion of the army are used by toy companies. Makers of various popular military action figures, vehicles and guns use war movie scenes either in advertisements or as still images on the case of the toy. All of this attracts kids to their product. If a child sees images of Rambo using a machine gun to spray endless rounds of ammunition against the enemy, they'll want the toy gun to emulate the hero they've been told to love. Hall also points out that imagination is sucked out of the use of the toy and replaced with imitation.

I had one disagreement with Hall's observation. She argues that these types of toys lead children to collect rather than play. While collecting can certainly be a part of some toys, based on my own childhood I would argue that collection was not the main focus of buying more toys. It was the ability to expand the storyline that could be made or provided and overall to enhance the level of play. But perhaps not all children play with these kinds of toys the way I did.

Overall, I thought Hall drew some very interesting relationships between the 'war narrative' set up by a movie and the transfer of that to toys for kids. But thus is capitalism. Sports are popular, so it sells games and movies. Comics are popular, so they do the same. The military is an equally popular genre of films and toys. The question is whether or not it has a negative impact on youth and what can be done about it.