Baby Shaker: A Fun Form of Pretend Child Abuse!
It appears Apple has pulled an iPhone app that outraged child advocates and, well, makes you kind of queasy to read about.
Called “Baby Shaker,” the 99-cent app, developed by Sikalosoft, made iPhones cry incessatnly like a baby while showing a charcoal drawing of a kid. How to comfort/quiet the needy squawker? You shake it. Hard. Ha, ha! So fun … it’s a crying baby and you shake it until the eyes become two red Xs … that’s hilari — oh, maybe not so much.
What’s weird is that Apple didn’t reject that app in the first place — they’ve rejected other violent ones. Oh, and ones with swear words. But Baby Shaker! Well, Baby Shaker had been available for download since Monday. Only now it’s been pulled so you’ll have to settle for something else.
Here’s what the critics say. From the LA Times and CNET:
“This horrible iPhone app will undoubtedly be downloaded thousands of
times by others in that same young male demographic — the population
group that is already statistically the most likely to shake babies,”
Jennipher Dickens, communications director for the Sarah Jane Brain
Foundation, said in the release. ” As a result of the child abuse my
son endured in the form of shaken-baby syndrome, my son now has
irreversible brain damage.”
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Image: Tom Krazit/CNET, via CNET.com.au
I agree with the comments here – this is disgusting.
beth, I have to say that personally I see no redeeming quality to this application. This was not designed to teach a lesson. It makes the connection between shaking and death, not just more obvious but a game! It dehumanizes infants and makes cynical, light of shaken baby syndrome. That is a serious problem. when it comes to babies there are many stupid and clueless people out there who will find something like this encouraging.
It’s a terrible idea, but I don’t think it’s encouraging anyone to shake their baby. If anything, it makes the connection between shaking and death that much more obvious.
Totally disgusting. As a person who works with a family with a shaken child, I’m disgusted by this or for anyone who thinks it’s fun!
I was hoping someone would write about this. I saw the article this morning. What a lousy idea for an application. It is not funny, just disgusting. This is a case in which I am very fearful about the message being sent.