Dinosaur Experts In Uproar After Hasbro Referred To ‘Jurassic World’ Raptor Toys As Malebo

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  She’s a lady. Whoa, whoa, whoa, she’s a lady.

  Anyone who’s familiar with Jurassic Park knows that all the dinosaurs in the park were engineered to be female — this, to control the animals from making their own dino babies and overwhelming the humans. So then why did Hasbro rewrite the Jurassic Park canon by rebranding its Jurassic World dinosaur toys as males in product descriptions for its raptor toys?

  It’s unclear, but dinosaur experts were up in arms over the decision to refer to the velociraptors as male in product descriptions for the toys, noted The Onion’s AV Club.

  

  The original description including male pronouns. (click to enlarge)

  Dinosaur expert Dustin Growick, host of the YouTube series The Dinosaur Show, initiated a Care2 petition “to tell Hasbro to stop reinforcing silly and antiquated gender role stereotypes on children and stop gender swapping dinosaurs.”

  He writes in the petition that the two Jurassic works “have inspired millions of children around the world—boys and girls alike—to be interested in dinosaurs, paleontology, and science. Just as many—if not more—of the biggest dinosaur enthusiasts are girls and women.”

  It seems his efforts paid off: Reading the description now on Hasbro’s site, the dinosaurs have gone back to being females (bolding ours):

  “Clever as ever, Jurassic World’s velociraptors are masterful hunters. And this awesome figure looks just like Velociraptor “Blue”! She’s ready to team up with her fellow Velociraptors (other figures sold separately) to hunt the ultimate predator! Her slashing claws and growling attack will destroy anything in her way. Let the hunt begin with your Velociraptor “Blue” figure!”

  We reached out to Hasbro for comment on why the raptor toy was initially branded a male, and will update you if/when we hear back.

  
  
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by Mary Beth Quirk

via Consumerist