New PCC - Stunticons, Undertow and Salvage

[Hursticon]

At this late stage, it is likely that the toys are well into production and ready to be shipped. Simply changing the names might mean pulping an entire production run (so far, anyway) of packaging and redoing it for all toys (including any wave/casemates who have Spastic as a cross-sell on the bottom of the packaging), delaying that wave/assortment. It's probably more cost-effective to just restrict that particular assortment to the United States and Canada, where Spastic's name is not a problem.

Hmm...
Fair point there FFN, maybe Hasbro could offer an exclusive UK/EU deal on their online store for those who want it then perhaps?

[GoktimusPrime]

You're still being influenced by Australia's british roots. Even in what you're saying here, you're putting an angrier, more damning weight on the word than it has in the US.

Well yes... Australian English is more closely related to British English (extended rant here ). But as griffin said, there doesn't appear to be a positive spin on this word even by US English standards.

In the North America, spastic (or spaz) has a similar weight to nerd, dweeb, doof, or dummy (in other words, the word has very little, if any, derogatory weight), then for them, this mildly negative term being used as a product name wouldn't be a big deal. To them, a spaz is somebody who is hyperactive, random, excitable, ie, Movie Frenzy.

I don't know if names like "Dweeb," "Dummy," "Nerd" or "Doofus Dorkimus" would sound cool even to American ears. Sure... 'spastic' may not sound as terribly offensive to Americans, but I don't think it sounds terribly 'cool' or 'awesome' either.

As I understand it, Americans consider the word "damn" to be far more taboo than we do. I've been told that Americans won't say this word in front of polite company, or if a child said it in front of an adult they'd be reprimanded for using profanity. But here it's not considered a profanity... but nor is it considered a terribly good word either. It seems the equivalent Australian English word would be "hypo" (e.g. 'Red cordial makes me hypo.') -- to be called hypo may not be as offensive as being called spastic, but a mild insult is still an insult nonetheless.

You guys are frothing yourselves up into personal rage and offense on behalf of other people for an oversight.

Because it is an offensive word to us. Yes, it's more offensive in the context of Australian English, but guess what - we're Australians. And Australia is a Hasbro market. Hasbro USA may have completely unintentionally done this - fine, I get that... but it doesn't mean they shouldn't do something about. If you were walking in a public place and you accidentally stepped on a stranger's foot, then you'd apologise right? Sure, you didn't mean to hurt them, but you did, so you are obliged something about it (i.e. say sorry). Likewise Hasbro USA have unintentionally made a lot of people feel upset with the choice of this name, thus they are obliged to do something about it, e.g. withhold sales of this toy in non-North American markets (or better yet, change the names for those markets) -- but they are obliged to do something and not just sit back there and say, "We didn't mean it so get off our backs."

Besides, spastic has previously been used in Transformers, modified to sound "more transformery", in the past: Spasma.

'Spasma' is a combination of 'spasm' and 'asthma' - as in when an asthmatic gets so upset that s/he suffers an asthma attack. But I don't think there's necessarily a pejorative or insulting connotation to that word. Not all words used to describe things are necessarily insulting (and as this episode has taught us, the magnitude of the offense can vary in different regions, apparently in American "wanker" isn't taboo as it is here (there's a Transformers voice actor whose screen name - as it appeared in the credits - was WANKUS - a deliberate cross between 'wanker' and 'doofus')). Also Nebulans are really more like accessories. Apeface was the toy, Spasma was his headmaster accessory.

I'm an asthmatic and I don't find 'spasma' offensive.

At this late stage, it is likely that the toys are well into production and ready to be shipped. Simply changing the names might mean pulping an entire production run (so far, anyway) of packaging and redoing it for all toys (including any wave/casemates who have Spastic as a cross-sell on the bottom of the packaging), delaying that wave/assortment. It's probably more cost-effective to just restrict that particular assortment to the United States and Canada, where Spastic's name is not a problem.

...or Hasbro Australia could print stickers with a different name to cover up wherever the name "Spastic" appears on the packaging.

As I said before, there have been precedents of where Hasbro has done this before, e.g. on the back of the Beast Machines Deployer cards and the legal blurb stickers on the Australian imported Japanese Masterpiece boxes. IIRC they even have the address and phone number for Hasbro Australia (I never bought any of them so I'm going off memory). It would be relatively cheap for Hasbro AU to make these stickers and it would allow them to sell the product here without fear of a public backlash (cos can you imagine any parent of a disabled child walking into a toy aisle and seeing a toy on a shelf with a name like "Spastic"??).

Not selling it here would be an option too, but feels more of a cop-out to me. IMO if Hasbro really wanted to try and make this toy work in our market (and other non-American Anglophone markets), then they would consider other alternatives like just making those stickers. Stickers would mean they wouldn't need to actually repackage any of the toys (just as our Deployers and Japanese Masterpieces were never repackaged - hell, other than the legal blurb sticker almost all the text on our imported MPs here were in Japanese!).

[christalcase]

errrr, what happens when people peel off the stickers??? It'll still have "Spastic" behind it and then people will still be insulted