You Tell Us: Do the Malia and Sasha Dolls Go Too Far?
Ty Inc. recently released two new dolls, named “Sweet Sasha” and “Marvelous Malia,” that they claim have nothing to do with the Sasha and Malia Obama. According to a Los Angeles Times article, Ty spokesperson Tania Lundeen says that “there’s nothing on the dolls that refers to the Obama girls” and that “it would not be fair to say they are exact replications of these girls. They are not.”
What do you think? Are these dolls cute and harmless, or do you feel like Ty is exploiting President Obama’s young children? You tell us!
Tags: dolls, malia, Obama, sasha, You Tell Us
January 23rd, 2009 at 9:42 am
When I saw what Ty was up to on the news it made me questions some items. Why did they make these dolls? Did they ever think about the Obama girls and their feelings? Clearly there is a line and perhaps it was crossed in this case. I know that they certainly do look like the girls (not identical) and given the timing it makes it look a little worse on the side of Ty.
All those years ago Ty made the Princess Diana purple teddy. Nobody ever questioned that because it was tasteful. They never tried to make something in her likeness. Perhaps that is something that they should/could have done this time.
January 23rd, 2009 at 10:15 am
Cute, but not appropiate to use private citizen’s, and children at that, likeness and names to market anything. There is a lawsuit waiting to happen there. “TY” should have know better. Shame on them!
January 23rd, 2009 at 10:29 am
I don’t see the dolls doing much harm to the girls, but I do think it’s silly of Ty to try to act like these dolls have NOTHING to do with the Obama children. They are obviously just trying to protect themselves against any sort of lawsuit. It’s a pretty sketchy sales tactic that will, most likely, work wonders for their company. It’s sad that a company can be sneaky and still gain a huge amount of revenue.
January 23rd, 2009 at 11:47 am
There is just too much coincidence here for me to believe that this was not intentional. Even if (if we give them the benefit of the doubt) it was unintentional, then after the fact when it was brought to their attention they should have changed the names.
I think it is extremely distasteful to so blatantly capitalize off of these two little girls. Their father is the public figure, not them.
January 24th, 2009 at 11:16 am
I call BS and think these dolls were done in such bad taste. It’s pretty obvious that they were designed to resemble those two girls. And the release time? A little too coincidental. I agree with Nia, “Their father is the public figure, not them.”
March 21st, 2009 at 4:32 am
Yes, it is going way to far because Malia and Sasha are to regular people and i dont think that is right…i bet they would want to be treated like regular people…you guys went very far and thats just going overboard.