8 Weirdly Sexual Products You Won't Believe Are for Kids
Raising a little girl is hard. You have all these decisions to make: schools to choose, what to feed them, how to make sure they don't grow up half as weird as you did. And of course, at some point you'll have to tell her about the birds and the bees. But all that sex stuff can wait until later, right?
Well, around age six, if your nearest department store is to be believed. In stores and catalogues for kids you can find items like ...
Tesco Peek-a-Boo Stripper Pole
This is one of those pictures you see floating around the Internet, and you always just assume it's either 1) a photoshop or 2) some handmade project from a feminist making some heavy-handed statement about the exploitation of young girls. "Just imagine if they sold toy stripper poles!" But, the toy is very real and was indeed sold in the toy section.
In case you were thinking the pole dancing kit was intended for some kind of nonstripper (poles make for good exercise, right?), then you didn't notice it comes with a garter and play money to stuff into it.
Good old-fashioned exercise!
The product was sold in a chain called Tesco, which is like the Walmart of Great Britian, who denied that this was marketed to children and has since relegated it to the exercise department. That's not only about as transparent as selling a pole dancing kit in the children's toy section -- it's also a hilariously blatant lie. As advertised on the website before being forced to take it down, the Peek-a-Boo Pole Dancing Kit was "suitable for participants of 11 years old and upwards."
Oh, bonus fun fact for those of you whose eyeballs are still intact: The product description on the box invites purchasers to "unleash the sex kitten inside."
A Tesco burns down from, we assume, combustible shame.
Bratz Hooker Babies
Let's pretend you're shopping for your 9-year-old daughter. You grab the typical stuff little girls like -- a unicorn backpack, a pretty psychedelic dolphin trapper keeper (that's what little girls are buying these days, right?). And now, to the toy section. There you see the Bratz dolls:
Huh. Those are definitely hot pants and high heel leather knee boots there. But, hey, millions of girls were raised on Barbie, with her gigantic inhuman boobs and they turned out fine, right?
Wait, are those snake skin pants?
We like how you can pick between the stiletto heel shoes and the stiletto heel boots. You know, for different occasions.
Well, OK, so maybe your kid's not old enough yet for dolls meant for the "16- to 20-year-old girls who still play with dolls" demographic. And to be fair, while having these dolls as her role models might make back-to-school clothes shopping for your daughter a battle, the dolls are themselves adults. It's not like they're telling your little girl that at her age she needs to dress like she's in the background of a rap video.
Now, meet Bratz "Twiins" Roxxi and Phoebi:
That's ... Jesus, can we go to jail for having a picture of an infant in a leather jacket and black panties on the site? And are we wrong to think that 100 percent of the people in the world named "Roxxi" who wear short, pink fur coats are hookers? We'd think we were misinterpreting what we're looking at there, but we actually can't find a photo of these dolls not dressed skankily:
But, still, it's not like they're specifically selling push-up bras and thongs to your kid ...
Abercrombie & Fitch Push Up Bra For 7-Year-Olds
We all know that building real confidence and self-esteem is perhaps the most important thing you can do for your child. There are lots of ways to help them along with this: hugs, rigorous readings of Judy Blume and the occasional bar fight with your kid's enemies' fathers, the trophies of which you leave under your child's pillow to find the next morning.
"Be right back. Daddy's gonna go get a 12-pack of confidence."
But take a stroll through Abercrombie and Fitch and you'll find that there is a market for parents who think that the best way to boost the self-esteem of your first-grader is via a bikini top that will enhance her bustline.
Since A&F came under fire for selling the "push-up" bikini tops to little girls (and yes, the word "push-up" was on the description), they caved and took them off the shelves and swore to never try to showcase your 7-year-old daughter's boobs ever again. Just kidding! First, they simply changed the name of it from "push-up" to "padded." Then they relented and agreed to only market the "padded" tops to 12-year-old girls. Oh, but they made sure they still fit 10-year-olds.
"Honey, we need to have a talk about your inadequate, disappointing breasts."
Abercrombie & Fitch Thongs for Little Girls
OK, Abercrombie is clearly just fucking with us at this point.
Not only is the above thong sold in the goddamn kid's section where you'd expect to find the Spongebob Underoos, but the tiny thong contains the words "Eye Candy" and "Wink, Wink." This is made to fit girls as young as 7.
Not that they're trying to sexualize your child, or get free publicity by drawing web traffic from pedophiles (wink, wink).
Tramp Stamps for Your Toddlers
Oh, hey, you know what would be great for drowning out all those sudden, uneasy questions about why thongs are being marketed to extremely underage girls? A visit to the cute little kiddie vending machines next to the door on the mad dash out of the mall! Those machines are just filled with innocent little things you can buy your child, like colorful gumballs, unicorn stickers and those sticky, gummy hands that eventually wind up covered in lint.
Also? Fake lower back "tramp stamp" tattoos.
Or, to put it like Vince Vaughn's character in The Wedding Crashers, the "tattoo on the lower back. Might as well be a bull's eye." Hey, Vince, we'd like you to do that line for us in front of our tattooed 5-year-old!
Playboy Merchandise for Kids
From the same people who give you porn from behind gas station counters and reality shows about swinger couples, comes school supplies all emblazoned with the Playboy logo. Pencils, pencil cases, folders, ring binders ... really everything she'll need to organize a grade school education while letting the boys know she's the cool girl in class.
And just to be clear, that is school stationary aimed at underage girls, and ol' Hef dares you to look at all the fucks he's not giving. From his own mouth, "I don't care if a baby holds up a Playboy bunny rattle."
This many fucks. Look at them all.
Sexy Costumes for Kids
Well, there's certainly nothing new about oddly unsettling "sexy" Halloween costumes. But there's something not quite right about this sexy cop ... oh God she's 12.
Oh, how sometimes you long for the days of your youth, when you'd dress as Dracula and Frankenstein and that four-year stretch where you were a princess every trick or treat night. Times have changed. Every word in this sentence links to a different "sexy" costume aimed at children.
While every single one of these costumes have "child" in the description, you'll see teenagers modeling a few of them. That's not some kind of mistake on their part, as there are subcategories of pre-teen and teen costumes with age-appropriate models in them. We would think that maybe seeing a 5- to 7-year-old in some of these would be too much for the consumer, but then you see costumes like this:
... and realize that someone is buying them. "Mom, can I be a sexy maid this year?" "Whatever, sweetie. Make sure you get one with fishnets."
Virgin Waxing
So this was the point when you decide to trap your little girl indoors for a few years. Finally it's time to open the padded cage doors, unlock that Hello Kitty leg chain and let your little girl embrace the world for all its beauties and all its faults.
But now you'll feel like a fool, because you were supposed to be taking her to get bikini waxes all this time. Now you've screwed up!
"No, I thought you were taking her to get waxed!"
It's called "virgin waxing," and you're supposed to start at age 8. The theory is that if you start having this done before puberty, it will remove all of the hair roots and the pubic hair will never grow in. Boom! Your girl will have a permanent porn-star wax job at a fraction of the cost! That's great news because, as an oft-passed around quote in the Brazilian waxing community says, "If you want to sell the house, you have to mow the lawn."
No, it's OK. We made the same face.
Wanda Stawczyk, owner of Wanda's European Skin Care in New York, is quoted as saying, "In 10 years, waxing children will be like taking them to the dentist or putting braces on their teeth."
Sadly, Wanda, we're pretty sure you're right.
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For ways to ruin your children, check out 8 Insane Ways Parents Are Politically Brainwashing Children and 15 Unintentionally Perverted Toys for Children.
