Diapered Consumerism
"Americans spend $6 billion a year on things for their infants. . . One-quarter of the 4 million babies born each year will be registered at Babies R Us. 'Before you can register at Babies R Us,' wrote Caitlin Flanagan in The New Yorker, 'you must complete a form, which begins with spaces for the names of the registrant and co-registrant, for at Babies R Us you are first, and most essentially, not a parent but a shopper.' In the materials the store provided, 'The simplifying list of essentials ('Must Haves!') contained close to a hundred and fifty items.'" Touchstone, March 2005.
