6 Insane Ways Adults Have Tried To Ruin Children's Stuff
Over the past decade or so, it's become acceptable for adults to like kid's stuff again. Which is great, because now we can watch great shows like Steven Universe and Gravity Falls without getting the stink eye from the rest of civilization. Occasionally, though, adults will forget that kids too enjoy kid stuff, leading to situations that range from "slightly annoying" to "absolutely terrifying."
Adult Collectors Buy All The Star Wars Toys, Leave None For Kids
According to recent estimates, approximately 90 percent of all toys are Star Wars toys, and this percentage doubled upon the recent release of The Force Awakens. Stores across the nation stocked up on toys for "Force Friday," in hopes that they could cram enough bodies into their stores to generate a small black hole. And it nearly worked -- retailers watched as their new Star Wars toys sold out in massive numbers ... to fans who will probably never touch them again, save for the occasional dusting.
Obviously, The Force Awakens has wide-ranging appeal, with 34 percent of moviegoers being between the ages of 18 and 34, but nobody anticipated the degree to which adult male collectors would wait out all night to completely clear the shelves. Plenty of fans on social media complained that, despite waiting in line for hours at their local Toys 'R' Us or Target, there was almost nothing for them to buy, because the first ten or so people in line had descended on the toy aisles like a group of piranhas skeletonizing a cow. How piranhas and a cow ended up in the same room is a mystery, but so are scenes like this:
But all these megafans buying the toys as collector's items were only shooting themselves in the foot. Vintage toys from the 1970s and 1980s can go for thousands of dollars these days, but that's only because so few people bothered to keep them around. When the prequel trilogy came out, along with hundreds of Alderaans' worth of toys, they were snapped up by collectors by the thousands, which caused their value to drop to that of a lightly-used Tootsie Pop. So instead of securing a financial future crafted from the tears of children, these adults dropped hundreds of dollars on what will eventually become the backdrop for an episode of Hoarders.
Guys, if you really want to make money off these toys, tear them out of the packages and take pictures of all the figures making out with all the other figures. The demand for that will be substantially higher. And seeing as how A) we'll be getting Star Wars movies until the heat death of the universe; and B) male adults fucking stampeded to The Force Awakens, a few more decades of this bullshit will make the franchise as hip to the kids as C-SPAN.
The Wiggles Have Become Sex Symbols For Adult Women
Though you may not have heard of them, children's pop group The Wiggles is one of Australia's most successful musical groups, having released a whopping 44 albums and received critical acclaim for the last 25 years. If you aren't familiar with their music, here's one of their most popular tunes on YouTube, "Hot Potato."
Obviously, their biggest group of fans are children, but it turns out the Wiggles are beloved by another group -- a much older, lonelier, hornier group. For at least ten years, members of the band have been receiving letters from older women and single mothers who want to wiggle with them, so to speak. Some of the comments made were so suggestive that we don't even know what they are, because they couldn't be reprinted in an Australian newspaper (one of the few known cases of Australia giving a fuck).
A 2009 interview with Anthony, the Blue Wiggle (which is also the worst superhero name we've ever heard), revealed that the group has dedicated groupies bearing Krispy Kremes, and has received at least one erotic jigsaw puzzle. The interview also included photos of Anthony which, honestly, explain an awful lot.
The episode where The Wiggles visited a tattoo parlor received critical acclaim.
After years and years of this mommy panty-dropping, The Wiggles have given up on fighting their adult fanbase, and they've started doing some adult-only shows. Recently, The Wiggles held a benefit "reunion" show that could only be attended by people aged 18 or over, partly due to the sale of alcohol at the show -- something we don't think Sesame Street would be able to pull off.
yummy, yummy
As you would expect from a bunch of grownups watching an act they enjoyed as toddlers, most people in attendance were completely fucking blasted. But if you thought this would be the show where The Wiggles let their hair down, you'd be wrong: They played it exactly as they would play it for children. Which makes sense, since that was probably the average brain function at the time for these alcohol-doused adults.
Bronies Are Getting Out Of Control
Do we really need to explain bronies? We're 95 percent sure you know what they are. Hell, we're sure a solid chunk of you are bronies, reading this article because someone on social media said that we were talking about you. Thanks for that, by the way.
Well, for the three of you who don't know: "Bronies" are the group of adult, mostly male fans of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. They arrived at the same time the show did, at first ironically, then legitimately after they realized that it's quite well-made for a kid's show. Unfortunately, nothing good lasts forever on the internet, and things started getting weird, even when you try to ignore the veritable mountains of MLP pornography (and no, we are not providing any links here).
A couple years ago, Tumblr removed a pornographic MLP fan blog called "Ask Princess Molestia," which in a normal universe would have been the most uncontroversial sentence in history. But because everything is awful, a large number of bronies got outraged, and proceeded to do what the internet always does when it's outraged: blame a woman and try to ruin her life.
Seventeen-year-old Tumblr user pinkiepony, who reported the blog to Hasbro after her 12-year-old sister came across "Molestia" by accident, was inundated with cryptic threats and allegations of white supremacy, and even tracked down via GPS coordinates, because Hell hath no fury like a man online who isn't able to see sex literally everywhere he looks.
Recently, though, it seems that Hasbro has realized that they are fighting a losing battle. While trademark and copyright law forces them to do things such as send cease-and-desist letters to the creators of a My Little Pony MMO, they've decided they could get their hands on that sweet adult collector money, rather than try to curtail the rising tide of bronies. A new high-quality line of figures called <3 My Little Pony is being designed to sell for hundreds of dollars apiece, also known as "a significant fraction of an iPhone."
There's no word on when Hasbro will start spray-painting and selling real ponies, but we're reasonably sure they wouldn't be able to keep them in stock.
A Children-Only Harry Potter Event Was Cancelled By Bitter Adults
The Harry Potter franchise occupies an interesting cross-generational space. While it started out geared toward children, the books and films matured along with their audience, and now it has a thriving adult fanbase which loves to celebrate wizarding and witchcraft alongside their kids. And by that, we mean they had better be invited to everything Harry Potter-related, or else.
The idea of a children-only event at a goddamned library should not be one to spark any controversy, but try telling that to the adult witches and wizards of Perth, Australia. The City of Perth Library was planning a Potter-themed event to introduce children to the new facilities and staff, but the adult fans in the city were so upset at not being included that they complained until the event was postponed, with the library promising an all-ages event at some point in the future. The adults then celebrated briefly before heading out to crash every child's birthday party they could find.
parties whenever they want, adults never get anything cool.
Meanwhile, London is taking the opposite approach, offering a studio tour that can only be attended by people 18 years or older. In December of last year, fans paid about $350 apiece to take part in a banquet in Hogwarts' famous Great Hall -- and, just like with The Wiggles, to get completely drunk off of butterbeer and actual beer. They got to tour Platform 9 3/4, partake in dancing, and even receive their own magic wand, which we're certain resulted in at least three serious injuries and one stabbed eyeball before the night was over.
Oddly enough, we didn't see anyone complaining that the adults-only Potter event was excluding children and not being appropriate for all ages. It's almost like this has less to do with inclusiveness and more about abject selfishness -- but then again, maybe we've been Confunded.
Overbearing Parents Turn A PEZ Easter Egg Hunt Into Thunderdome
Back in March, for the third year in a row, the PEZ Visitor Center in Connecticut laid out thousands of colored eggs as part of their annual Easter egg hunt. The staff watched with smiles on their faces as hundreds of children and their parents lined up to start hunting, only to have their smiles slowly turn to expressions of horror as the innocent event devolved into the church scene from Kingsman.
As you may have already expected, the parents stormed the fields en masse to grab as many eggs for their children as they could, even violating start times and trampling the kids-only egg hunt field. Baskets were broken, eggs were stolen from children, and at least one little boy received a bloody nose from one of the parents, who were desperate to collect as many eggs as possible. These adults would be goddamned if their child was going to leave with anything less than the most eggs, because that's what good parenting is.
The PEZ company acknowledged the sudden emergence of a Fight Club in a statement which tactfully placed the blame on adults being complete assholes, ignoring directions from staff, and basically having flashbacks to the most recent Black Friday. Other parents described the mob as a horde of "locusts," swarming from one field to the next, completely stripping them of all eggs and sanity.
To their credit, PEZ tried their best to make it up to the victims of the egg hunt. They offered apologies and free candy to all the empty-handed attendees, which they obtained by tilting the employees' chins upward and taking the candy from their throbbing necks.
Furries Really, Really Love Children's Mascots
We at Cracked have no issue with furries, but there's no denying that furry-related things get weird sometimes. Consider the following:
1) Furries, like most people, are sexual beings with sexual desires.
2) Pretty much all well-known anthropomorphic animal characters are targeted toward children.
And that is how you get people on Twitter asking to be fisted by Tony the Tiger.
This is not an isolated incident. It seems Tony the Tiger is the Blue Wiggle of the furry community, because he gets sexual propositions on social media all the damn time, from people who think his animal bod is just grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreat. Having the physical build of Dwayne Johnson and the voice of James Earl Jones really gets people going. It doesn't help that the red handkerchief he always wears is apparently a secret code for fisting, hence the above request (and more detailed ones we won't be showing here).
Good news for furries, though: Chester Cheetah is 100 percent DTF.
But Tony the Tiger has it easy compared to the characters of a newer property, Zootopia. A critically-acclaimed film about a society of anthropomorphic animals seems like a dream for furries the world over -- and nobody knew this better than Disney itself, which reached out directly to furry communities to market the film. Either they were unaware of how much fanmade porn would come out of this (the answer is so, so much), or they figured it was an acceptable loss.
Others have noticed that the film contains elements that seem to be appealing directly to adult furries. They remarked on elements such as the characters' shapeliness, the fact that one of the main characters is a fox (a highly popular fursona), and the end credits, in which a sexy gazelle played by Shakira dances with a bunch of Tony the Tiger knockoffs who are clearly ready for business.
True story: Shakira requested that her hips continue to never lie in the film.
This scene is a teaser for the sequel, Zootopia 2: Yiff Harder.
Jim can be found ruining everything else in the world on his Twitter, or writing game reviews and editorials on GeekNifty.
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