Toymaker Hasbro is renaming the potato-shaped plastic toy it introduced in 1952 to the gender-neutral moniker “Potato Head.”
The classic dress-up statuette with changeable facial features including removable noses, eyes and ears will be packaged to reflect its updated name in 2021.
Fast Company, which first reported the news, writes that the change allows kids “a blank slate to create same-sex families or single-parent families.” It calls the shift an example of how heritage toy brands are adapting to the 21st century.
“By offering a toy that exists outside of the binary of male and female, Hasbro is helping kids to simply see toys as toys, which encourages them to be their authentic selves outside of the pressures of traditional gender norms,” Chief Communications Officer Rich Ferraro said in a statement.
Some were not happy.
And finally this has pushed some guy named Mark Dice to want to secede.
