One of the newest, most popular iPhone games to hit the market is Race Penguin. The game consists of you controlling a penguin to try and outrun a polar bear, and it is extremely addicting! I have to admit I downloaded the game two weeks ago and play at least once a day. As you move further along in the game, you are able to unlock special penguin characters with superpowers. First there is Super Penguin who can go higher, go faster, and have more control. Next is Magical Penguin who can teleport uphill and get a boost for every perfect slide. What is alarming is these characters are depicted as male penguins, and then finally there is a female penguin with blond, luscious hair and a red bow to unlock. Her superpower? Nothing. Instead of being super fast or have special powers, her description simply says, "Unlock a cute penguin girl." Oh, and her name is Penguinette.
What stuck me about this is just how invisible sexism can be. I have been playing this game for two weeks and never even noticed this until yesterday. I was excited to unlock the girl penguin to see what she could do, but once I unlocked her nothing changed except now my penguin was blond. Little kids who play this game will thus have an impression that for some reason the girl penguins are not as good as the boys. While this seems trivial, it still shows just how sexist our society is. Even in a stupid game women are thought of as subordinate to men. Despite children not fully understanding that this is blatant sexism, the impression it gives will make an impact on them whether we realize it or not.
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