Doll comes with an Islamic message

What should have amounted to child’s play ended up as no laughing matter for one Beauregard family Wednesday afternoon after a trip to an Opelika store.

On a recent shopping trip, Amber Meacham, 27, and her 2-year-old daughter, Kirsten, purchased a Little Mommy Cuddle & Coo doll made by the Fisher-Price Company.

When cuddled, the doll makes a number of audible cuddles and coos, but the doll Meacham purchased has another unique phrase in its literary repertoire.

The doll can be heard saying what sounds like “Islam is the light.”

The doll’s packaging makes no reference to any religious affiliation or content.

Meacham contacted the Opelika Target store where she made the purchase to talk to managers. She asked them to pull the product from their store shelves, something Meacham says they said they would not do that without a recall notice from the doll’s manufacturer. A manager at the Opelika store and a customer service representative who answered a corporate office number told the Opelika-Auburn News that a recall from the manufacturer is required to pull any product.

Meacham then contacted Fisher-Price’s parent company, Mattel, Inc., and spoke with a company representative that documented her concerns and informed her that she was not the only consumer that had contacted the company with similar concerns about that particular doll.

A phone call to the Mattel Company made by the Opelika-Auburn News Wednesday afternoon netted an automated voice message response.

Meacham and her husband Paul are Christians, but say they respect others rights to choose their own faiths as they would like to have the right to raise their daughter in the faith they so choose respected.

“I was told that there was a bad chip in the dolls that made them speak as they did, but the stores I have contacted still won’t pull the existing dolls from their shelves,” said Meacham. “The doll should only coo and say mama.”