After news broke that Hasbro was subjecting employees to racial bias training, the toymaker began publicly backing away from Critical Race Theory (CRT). But public statements on the company’s corporate website suggest the reported CRT instruction does reflect its official position.
As The Daily Wire reported, whistleblower David Johnson, a packaging engineer, leaked documents to conservative guerrilla journalism outlet, Project Veritas, showing that Hasbro instructed employees that children as young as three could be guilty of a “pro-white bias.”
Some of the documents’ claims:
“By age three, children are already starting to apply stereotypes, and research shows that they also may use racist language intentionally at this age. White children at this age may report explicit or overt negative attitudes towards people of color … By age four, kids are showing a strong and consistent pro-white anti-black bias.
At the age of five, children show many of the same racial attitudes held by adults … Children are really sensitive to the status of different racial groups in our society and show a high-status bias towards white people, which is the socially privileged group in our society. White children show pro-white bias at this age.”
Now, Hasbro is claiming the training has been “mischaracterized” in the media, and that the statements were simply from a guest speaker from California nonprofit The Conscious Kid offering a “diverse [viewpoint].”
“Our mission is to create the world’s best play and entertainment experiences that connect children, fans, and families around the world,” a Hasbro spokesperson told the Daily Mail. “We occasionally invite third-party speakers for optional sessions to discuss diverse viewpoints. As always, the views expressed by external speakers are their own and do not reflect the views of the company.”
Yet documentation on the toymaker’s corporate website suggests that Hasbro’s official views do align with ideas aligned with “anti-racist” activism and Critical Race Theory, including its commitment to race-based hiring and the belief that racism is a widespread issue in the U.S.
An open letter from CEO Brian Goldner speaks of “systemic racism” and the “pervasive racist events that continue to plague our society.” Another references “unconscious bias.”
In a company video that highlights Hasbro’s role in “[shaping] minds and hearts from the earliest age,” Goldner references the concept of “privilege,” a cornerstone of CRT activism, saying, “It’s time for us with the privilege of power to reflect on how best to use this privilege to bring about a more just world.”
Among the assertions on the company’s “Diversity and Inclusion Page” are the following statements:
We are committed to our goal to grow ethnically and racially diverse employee representation in the U.S. to 25 percent by 2025. We’ve also taken several meaningful steps the past few years to help build a stronger, more diverse workforce and address unconscious bias in the hiring process, including the goal of establishing protocols to establish a 50 percent diverse interview slate for all open positions in the U.S.
Notably, Hasbro has not always been so accommodating to diverse viewpoints.
After Disney fired Mandalorian actress Gina Carano for expressing conservative political views on social media, the company stopped manufacturing action figures of her popular character, Cara Dune.
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