When Tupperwear would do just fine

So, the question on my mind alot of late is "why do I bother spending money on baby toys, when Gillian's favorite things are NOT baby toys?". I mean, there is obviously nothing as much fun to thrash around as a plastic Pizza Hut bag; there is no cause and effect toy quite so satisfying as a portable phone on speaker (preferably with another human being on the other end, although the pre-recorded voice that says "if you'd like to make a call, please hang up and try again" still is plenty exciting enough to shriek about); there is no musical instrument you can buy that can compare to banging plastic ziploc disposable containers (that most of us don't dispose of because they're plastic), either with the spoon she'd rather play with than eat from or by banging two together. So, why do I insist on teethers when the DVD remote is so much shinier? And books?? Why, when restaurant menus are so utterly riveting? (ok, that last one is mostly tongue in cheek...kindof). I suppose at some point, it will click that the things she is playing with were made specifically as a toy, for her. But that day is not today. Until then, I will try to refrain to buying in to the giant con that is the baby industry (which I seem to do on a regular basis, to my own lament, but there are some clever (and completely adorable) toys out there!). And it is a con. I am very certain that babies will learn about cause and effect without pull toys, and that there are brilliant people out there everywhere who didn't have baskets full of multi-color, multi-texture, peek-a-boo mirror, flap styling, flashing, music-playing, brain stimulating teethers/stuffed animals/[insert anything else] growing up*. In fact, it might do a child good to have to use his own imagination every now and then. My grandmother and her nine siblings pretended corn cobs were dolls (with a rag around the waist for a woman's apron, and around the neck for a man's necktie). As far as I can tell, they didn't suffer for it.

So, the question is, why do we feel so obligated to surround our children with all this clutter, spending gobs of money, when Tupperwear would do just fine?

*to be fair, we have exactly one small basket full of toys (but let's not get into "gear", which is out of control around here); that being said, I can literally only point to a few things in the basket that the child has ever bothered to notice. The rest, I feel, have been a waste.