Kardashian Kids Clothing Line Is Safe... For Now

Another day, another Kardashian controversy. This time, you may find yourself actually on their side for once. A Kansas woman tried to get the Kardashian Kids line pulled from Babies R Us claiming that the clothes sexualize children. But now, she's saying that the endeavor was all in the name of a social experiment.

Amie Logan launched a petition on Change.org, which has since been cancelled, calling for the store to remove the Kardashian Kids line from their shelves. If you haven't perused the Kardashian Kids line, it includes a leatherette skirt, faux-fur trimmed coat, and other relatively innocuous trendy baby clothes for 0-24 month olds. However, Logan's logic seems to be that if Babies R Us endorses Kim, they're setting kids up to want to be sex tape stars.

Wait, what?!

In her petition, which garnered nearly 3,000 signatures, Logan wrote:

I don’t want my child to grow up to be a sex tape star. You pulled the Breaking Bad toys because they promoted drug use. You should pull this clothing line because it promotes bad behavior as well. The madness has to stop. If the toys are damaging so is the clothing.

As you may remember, Logan is referring to a Change.org petition started by a Florida mother to have Breaking Bad figurines removed from Toys R Us stores across the nation in October. In the same way that Susan Schrivjer alleged the action figures glamorized drug-related activity and violence, Logan argues that the Kardashian Kids collection encourages 0-24 month olds to aspire to a life of harlotry. Yes, babies. I could barely say "Dada" at age and one-and-a-half, let alone "I wanna be a sex tape star when I grow up." Sure, everyone's entitled to their own beliefs, but maybe if you hold the belief that the clothes will have such an effect, you just shouldn't buy them.

Commenters on Logan's petition got super trolly, calling Toys R Us' endorsement of the Kardashians "disgusting" and saying "babies don't need to look like porn stars." Beyond the reactions of Logan's supporters, plenty of folks on the Internet saw this connection of future sexually to baby clothes entirely absurd and troubling. The Stir's Michele Zipp says that Logan's complaints were "some of the most ridiculous claims I've heard in a while" and identified that calling baby clothes "slutty" is entirely confounding. Plenty of people on Twitter echoed a similar sentiment:

Some folks, however, were less diplomatic:

In the face of criticism and backlash, Logan pulled her petition and replaced it with a confessional letter revealing that there true motivation was to start a conversation. She wrote,

When I started the petition, my goal was to point out the hypocrisy of Toys R US pulling the Breaking Bad toys, but still having a clothing line sponsored by the Kardashians. My point was not that people should not buy the items, or that Baby’sRUS/ToysRUS actually remove them from the shelves. I wanted ToysRUS/BabiesRUS to see that if they caved to one upset consumer that more would come out of the woodwork. I chose the Kardashian Kids line because I would not choose to put my daughter in these clothes, and because the Kardashians are not people that have the family values that I uphold.

Encouraging a dialogue is a great thing, but I don't think Logan went about it in the wisest way. She goes on to clarify that her mission wasn't to start a "crusade" against Toys R Us, but rather to "get people discussing who should be raising their children, and what things retailers have the right to sell." However, she used extremely reductive reasoning in doing so, implying that anyone who was fine with dressing their daughters in the Kardashian line was nursing a budding harlot. Sounds kinda like a crusade to me.

What Logan started with this petition was more of a partisan shouting match than a dialogue. As they always taught us in conflict resolution class, your point is more likely to be heard if you don't use polarizing language. Then again, such is the world of digital discourse. Also, maybe she should have started a thread on a parenting forum rather than opening a petition in her intention was just to have a back and forth. After all, aren't petitions what people use to get stuff done?

On Friday, the retailer announced that they had no intention of pulling the line. Amie Logan has now learned the lesson that all bloggers know: the Internet is like the Wild West. You've gotta be able to handle some pushback from the Twitterverse if you wanna start a dialogue toy retailers or which actors look like attractive birds.

Image: Babies R Us; Getty Images (2)