Today In Pop Culture: Yo, Joe!

By Jeffery X Martin

“Dolls are for girls,” say the unenlightened ones, the people who don’t understand that fun has no gender, the folks who have no grasp of nuance in their playtoys. Not to put to fine a point on it, but it’s jerks who say that, usually men, trying to cover up their tiny penises or homosexual tendencies they can’t let the rest of the hunting club notice, lest they be called out and ostracized.

All this to say that, on this day in pop culture, in the year 1964, the G.I. Joe was invented, and it was not a doll. It was an action figure.

Okay, it was an action figure based on a doll. At least, it was based on the buying habits of doll lovers and the people that love them.

Let’s think about the most popular doll in the world, Barbie. It’s not enough just buy a Barbie. You’ve got to buy the Barbie clothes, the Barbie beauty acessories, the Barbie Dream House, the Sit and Style, and everything that goes with Barbie’s cousin, Skipper, including that friggin’ horse.

In that respect, Hasbro envisioned G.I. Joe as Barbie for boys. There were four action figures originally, representing four of the branches of American military service. And the kids, as the kids say, ate it up. Within two years, G.I. Joe figures made up almost 66 percent of the company’s profits.

Here’s a neat fact: a screw-up in production gave the first G.I. Joe’s a scar on the face and a janky thumbnail. When other companies tried to produce knock-offs, Hasbro used those mistakes to their benefit. If it didn’t have facial disfiguration and an ingrown nail, it wasn’t a real G.I. Joe.

When American popular opinion became anti-military during the Vietnam War, Hasbro pulled G.I. Joe figures from the shelves. After falling back and regrouping, the toys were repackaged as more of an adventuring team. When they came back in the 1970s, they had righteous beards and the legendary Kung-Fu Grip, which they used to stop natural disasters, like earthquakes and K-Mart stores.

When Reagan took office, military toys came back into vogue, because imagine that. Fucking Reagan. This led to another identity reconstruction for the Joes. Soon, they all had code names and were fighting the terrorist organization known as COBRA.

Comic books, video games, movies that are kind of awful but have great action sequences and, as always, those not-dolls have kept the G.I. Joe name on the lips of people who enjoy fun.

Here’s another fun fact: Did you know that, as a parent, you can let your boys play with Barbie dolls? You can let you girls play with G.I. Joe action figures, too! That’s just something the civilized world would like you to know.

And knowing is half the battle.

Oh, come on. How did you think this article was going to end?