Toy Recalls

They are doing a massive recall of "Easy Bake Ovens" (see http://www.charlottesvillenewsplex.tv/news/headlines/5597091.html for one) because there have been reports of children getting their hands caught and burned in them.

Easy Bake Ovens have been around for since 1963. I'm sure there have been prior reports of hands being caught and burns. I seem to remember burning my fingers on the damn light bulb and pans we pulled out. (This was YEARS ago... :-\) Same with the Creepy-Crawler makers and a few other items that get hot. So why now?

I'm sure it has to do with today's lawsuit-happy society. It's also possible the new model catches hands easier, but I believe the threat of litigation made them do the recall.

There seems to be a lot of things that we, as kids did, that our kids can't experience, now-a-days. Parents are (sometimes rightly) too careful with what they allow their kids to do - like play outside without adult supervision (rightly), like playing with many of the toys we used to play with because they have "choking hazards" in them, like eating the (hard) paste from school (I think it was made with flour, and they must have added a bit of sugar in it, because it tasted pretty good back then! LOL), etc. Some toys have gone "by the wayside" because of the dangers: Have you seen many Creepy-Crawler sets around? The forms got hot, if I recall ... I think they made a comeback a while back, but haven't seen any commercials for some time... What about all those games with "small choking hazard" parts - Hungry, Hungry Hippo; Monopoly (OK... Maybe for older kids, but baby bro like to play with the hotels, right?); Scrabble for Kids; hell, Pick-up-Sticks had pointy ends!

And how do some products remain on the market for so long, despite their obvious dangers? How 'bout "choking hazards" of GI Joes, Barbies, and the like? They come with accessories (rifles, pistols, boots, high-heels, purses, etc.) that are small enough to put in your mouth... Those little wooden people used in the larger Lego things have hats and arms that can come (or be chewed) off causing choking hazards...

We played with HUNDREDS of toys that could/should have killed or seriously injured us. We played (God forbid) OUTSIDE with friends and no adult supervision. We swang on swing sets simply set on the ground (the legs weren't buried in concrete to counterbalance the weight)... We slid down HOT METAL SLIDES at the park and almost every playground. We went fishing in the park lagoon with REAL fish-hooks (and let me tell you.. they hurt! when they stick into your finger!) We jumped off our porch about 5' to the ground, and did little more than get stingers in our ankles, and if we landed wrong and twisted it, we just stopped jumping off the porch for a few days... We played Combat (a great show!) with toy guns and air rifles (friends' ... my parents would never buy me one...), shoving plugs of dirt into the barrels so they air rifles would "smoke" more like the real things we saw on TV... We skated around on metal skates that attached to our shoes... This only worked if we had an OLD set of GOOD shoes... The skates never locked down well on tennies'...

We used to use ice cubes and butter on burns we got from the stove, touching a hot pan, touching the edge of the oven or the oven rack or pan being pulled out... Mom knew how to put a lid on the pan (or throw salt on it) to stop a fire in it... We knew how to close the oven door while broiling, if it caught fire... We knew how to turn OFF the damn things we turned ON that caught fire and how to put those fires out.

We skinned our knees, scraped our hands and elbows, got stuck by thorns of many types, sometimes friends broke a finger, arm or leg on swing sets, and no one sued anyone... We fell off numerous swings (banging our heads), or "Jungle-Jim" bars; fell (or jumped) out of trees (sometimes breaking or spraining something, sometimes tearing clothes), fell off our bikes in the street and (usually) didn't get hit by a car; got hit in the face with basketballs, footballs, "kick-soccer" balls (those red things at school?); sprained wrists, ankles, knees, elbows; got stung by bees in the yard; stepped on rusty nails, and somehow we survived it all. And I don't recall ONE of our neighbors or friends suing or being sued. (Heck... I had a friend hit himself in the head with a claw hammer we were using to build something... No one even THREATENED a lawsuit... It was HIS stupidity for doing it to himself... Even if it was OUR hammer he did it with...)

Why have we suddenly decided we can sue for our, or our children's', own stupidity? Because some lawyer, somewhere, decided that they could make BooCoo bucks by suing the people with BIG money for something, and other lawyers decided THEY wanted to make some money, too.

Easy Bake Ovens SHOULD NEVER be used without adult supervision. The light bulbs used to cook the product gets hot, and the pans get hot, just like in a real oven... Remember... it has to get hot enough to COOK the stuff! And parents - With ANY item that gets hot like this, or has the potential to burn kids, you should MAKE SURE they know how to unplug it... Anything that uses electricity has the potential to start a fire. They should know how to deal with it. So should you.

(Oh, and those little plastic plug covers that are supposed to keep your kids from sticking screwdrivers and other things into the light sockets? They are potential chocking hazards, too, ya know? :-) )