Did Wanting Friends Influence Your Toy Purchases?

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Stuffed toys were prettymuch all that was provided in the way of toys by my parents. Then Lego and Construx. I still own the legos.

I saw my first action figure (a He-Man badguy) at about 9 years old and didn't know what to do with it. Saw my first transformer toy at about the same age (Mirage) and was entranced. But my mother refused to buy any others. She had a thing against gun-and-war like toys. I still managed to gather a few over the following years, out of my father.

My model elephant collection began by someone giving me one as a birthday gift.

As for toys, I only really got hooked one time: My Transformers Beast Wars collection (I have all of them from the release of air-razor to the end of the series) was initiated by a friend who got interested in the series and purchased one of the toys in my presence (1997?).

My only other collections are

Music - the first music I actually bought for myself was Van Halen Live... Incidently the inspiration to buy it was from the same friend. This would have been 1993? From there I devellopped my own tastes, but that was the trigger that introduced me to the concept of owning my own music.

Books. I always used the library as a kid and read quite a bit. But the concept of owning my own books - of pursuing specific authors' work, etc, came into reality only after my step mother introduced me to her collection of books. Since then I have devellopped my own tastes and interests in books, but that was the trigger (1989?)

Movies. My dad used to copy movies we rented. A few stayed around for a long time, and I always liked watching them over and again. I'm not sure when I first started bying my own movies, but I think the trigger was again, that same friend. Just as with CDs and the Transformer toys, I took this far beyond anything he had. But I chose my own and still do.

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So - I think in every case of interest that went "overboard", the initial introduction of the idea was by another person. But the pursuit appealed to my personality, and I then let the pusuit follow my own tastes and direction. (other than Transformers. Had to get em all )

But I never wanted toys to make friends.. I don't think it ever occurred to me because toys were Lego, private, and to be cherished and guarded against abuse by others. The only "shared toys" I ever encountered were at my grandmother's house... lincoln logs and plastic cars. Or at my cousin's house, where they would bring out their Strawberry Shortcake dolls and ask my sister and I to join in.

Just remember that in my case, my parents and teachers were convincing me to "do what the other kids do" and all that, and were more concerned with my being liked than if it was actually right for me.

Well, not my Dad, but everyone else pretty much.

Isn't it so surprising now that I have some feelings of resentment towards them, as well as most people in general after that disastrous experience?

Not really. I did get into all the elementary school fads but I was still into them long after everyone else had decided that they were "gay". I always bought whatever I thought was cool not what everyone else thought. Just because a lot of the time I bought the same things didn't mean they influenced it.

I did want a Barbie once to see what the other kids thought was so great about them. They were just like any other doll. I concluded that kids were silly.

To me, having many toys was pointless, but I liked to watch dolls. I hoped that other girls would like me if I had pretty dolls. So I had some, but I never played them.
Some boys liked me, because I had remote controlled tank.

I appreciate the social pressure to "fit in" and how it makes people buy stuff they don't really need or likely want.

I remember an incident where we were given a "play hour" at school. I brought a Matchbox car I liked and wanted to play with other kids who brought theirs in. They said I could if the teacher picked my car as a cool car. We went to the teacher, and will all our cars on display, each kid asked the teacher to pick one, but they used criteria that made it obvious to pick their own car. My car was last, and they said it wasn't cool enough for me to play with them.

I learned then that even if I did what people wanted, I'd not be allowed to associate with them.

This thread reminds me one Polish saying:

When s/he was a child, his/her parents gave him/her meat necklace to make the dogs wanting to play with her/him.

No I never bought toys just to make friends. In the old days it just wouldn't have occurred to me to do that, and when I found out it was commonplace ("be the envy of your pals - get one today!") I just thought "yeuk!" and wouldn't do it. If I bought a toy, it was purely for my personal enjoyment.

I can't remember doing this. My own obsession with cats really took any desire to do this over. I would always buy the cat.

I didn't have any conception that other people could have preferences different to mine until I was, ooooh 29?

I remember being really into Transformers. I think they were cool for a while, but that wasn't why I liked them.

Yes. I started collecting Pokemon cards 'cause all the cool kids were doing it.

It was the same in my childhood.
I had Barbies and other dolls and lots of other stuff, my parents bought me lots of things, because they didn't realised, why I never played with them.
When I took the toys to school, the other children asked me to borrow them the toys and then they played with it, but I never understood how to play with barbies when I was alone.

I only played ball games with my Moms Poodle and took him for long walks.
My parents saw that and when I was nine years old, they bought me a Rottie-Mix.
I loved her and everywhere I went, she was with me ( except school and it was a drama every morning).

i only ever wanted books, really...but i do remember having my mother buy me little cars, and marbles, because the boys downstairs only played with that and i wanted to do more than borrowing theirs. wanted them to be interrested in what i had, so i bought my own, but it took me such a loooong time to understand that i was actually supposed to, and that they were annoyed because they could only play but not win any marbles from me....TBH they were nice boys. they still liked me....but i still prefered reading children psychology books LOL.