I took my 10-year-old son out to buy some shoes the other day, along with his 7-year-old brother and 5-year-old sister. Three kids on one visit! We didn't have a whole lot of time, so I decided beforehand to take a 3 step approach to it.1) Set them loose to pick their own shoes.
2) Check the sizes and prices.
3) Buy them what they chose (so long as it wasn't too expensive) and get the hell out of there.
Pictured here are the bad-ass shoes my semi-emo-in-training, wanna-be-skateboarder 10-year-old picked out. I was limited on time, and they looked fine to me at first glance, so I had him throw them on, rip off the tags, and we paid and left.
Fast forward to the next afternoon. He had a tremendous knot tied in them that he couldn't undo, so I stooped down to assist him. And I got an eyeful of this:
Yeah, "XXX" stamped across the toe of a shoe made for 10-year-olds. Or maybe it's for adults who wear a size 2; I shouldn't jump to conclusions, right?
Naw, I went ahead and jumped to conclusions. This company, World Industries, and this shoe store, Shoe Carnival, were selling shoes for children that had "XXX" stamped across the toe. The skulls, I could handle. A little edgy, but boys always like skulls. The anarchy symbol? A little less acceptable, but honestly, that "A" doesn't mean what it used to anymore. Now it's just a random symbol of generic rebellion, not an actual outcry for a collapse of all world governments.
But "XXX"? No, NOT acceptable. I don't think it's right for my 10-year-old, or for ANYONE'S 10-year-old, to be advertising the rating for a graphic pornographic film on his toe.
Now in fairness, "XXX" is also the stamp that cartoons in the 30's and 40's put on the outside of whiskey bottles. It COULD have been referring to that. Which I would have found only slightly less offensive.
But please, spare me, we all know what it's referring to.
Well, I'm not a suck-up-and-take-it kind of guy when it comes to things like this. We went immediately to another shoe store and bought some better shoes. Not the same brand, either. F them; they don't get my money anymore.
And when I returned the porn shoes, I didn't slip in and shyly ask for my money back. I asked to see the manager, showed him the shoe, told him why I was returning it, and asked him why he was selling porn shoes for 10-year-olds. He had no reply. Neither did the manager in the second Shoe Carnival store I went to when I asked him the same question, standing in the aisle in front of the offending shoe, displayed at kid's-eye level.
Porn shoes. Honestly. Now, not only do I have to monitor what's on TV and the radio, and what websites they visit, and who sends them text messages and what those messages say- but on top of all that, I have to monitor his SHOES for porn references.
World Industries and Shoe Carnival. If you're as disgusted as I was/am, well, you know who to boycott now.
6 comments:
Not that this will make you feel tons better, but maybe make you less shoe vigilant. It is also the symbol for straight edge, which most kids that are heading towards the whole emo thing are pretty proud of. I would dare say that it more likely means that than anything else you might think. I hope this makes you feel maybe the tiniest bit better!
Actually, straight edge (i.e., refrainign entirely from tobacco, drugs and alcohol)is generally symbolized by a SINGLE X, written on the back of the hand (or tattooed on.) The Drummer of Minor Threat changed it to three x's, but written like this: xXx, alternating between lower and upper case. "sXe" refers to "straight edge" and "hXc" therefore refers to hard core straight edge.
At best, I could credit World Industries for mis-writing it on the toe of the shoe, but I'm still seriously doubting it refers to "straight edge".
I'm with you Steve, they knew exactly what they were meaning when they put that on the shoe. I wouldn't even let my teenager wear them! Why can't children just be innocent anymore?
The three xxx's also are an old symbol for poison, as are skulls are a symbol for poison...so I'd guess that's what it represents. But I couldn't entirely rule out your idea that it was meant as a symbol for porn as well (is porn a kind of poison?). Also, another symbol on those shoes is the letter A in a circle...and that's a symbol for anarchists...perhaps yet another reason to have returned the shoes. And it wouldn't surprise me if there were more crazy symbols on them.
Death, poison, and anarchy...etc??? I believe we are, at least to some degree, effected by what we surround ourselves with (including what we wear, listen to, etc.)
Well, I hope your son got some even cooler shoes to replace them. :)
I think everything these days is geared towards porn. I'm glad my kids don't come to the grocery store with me anymore, bc even in the check out line, there is tons of exposure to it. The porn industry isn't dummies. If they can get a kid hooked young, they've got money coming in for lots of years. Got job for sticking it to them.
ps have you seen the new Brittney Spears vidoe? I went to itunes and was on the homepage and saw a pic of her and it said, 'hear some of her new song Womanizer'. So one click and I'm watching a snip of the video with BUCK naked Brittney trying to revamp her career. ONE CLICK!!!!! I sent a huge email around warning moms about it.
welcome to the jungle, baby! that's what parenting is all about. my son's friend had "closer" by nine inch nails as his ringtone on his phone. google the lyrics, but watch out. needless to say, there was discussion had.
also, i'm having flashbacks of mark powell. weird.
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