Typically I am not one to go around throwing my opinion in people’s’ faces unless asked to do so. This, however is one of my few exceptions; I am so surprised by our generation. Mattel Inc. the company that makes Barbies, has announced that the new dolls will be coming in different shapes, skin colors, eye colors and hairstyles.
It’s pretty cool that we made a change to such an established toy, but at the same time it is sad. Why is it that Barbie now has a multitude of new looks? I’d like to say that it is because the company just wanted to expand its creations, but the truth is different.
Women (teens included), have taken an extreme way of compensating for their body image problems: blame them on toys you had as a child. Self-image has become a hot topic in the past few years with many women speaking out; whether it be about dress codes that are clearly gender biased or catcalling while walking on the street. Noticing these things as an adult however, should not be traced back to dolls.
We’ve long known that Barbie wasn’t proportional, but that never seemed to be a huge problem. In the past few years however, there has been a swing in the pendulum. I struggle to believe that there are thousands or even hundreds of women with body image issues just because they didn’t look like a doll they grew up playing with.
I understand that women now are more likely to notice and compare their body types to those around them. It has become a norm that we either want to look like model, or want to embrace our curves.
To the ladies out there that think this is a win for women, I wouldn’t consider it a win that we have to make a child’s toy a discussion point about body types. It will be a win when the discussion isn’t necessary at all.
The point also must be brought up that the change more likely comes from a need to make a profit. Mattel finally decided that in order to keep moms buying Barbies for their children the dolls needed to start changing.
I acknowledge that my opinion is the minority, only 30% of voters thought the change was a bit crazy on Twitter. What do you think? Vote below.
[socialpoll id=”2329986″]
Serena Bettis • Feb 5, 2016 at 12:23 pm
So I kind of completely disagree. It’s not only about body type and girls feeling insecure about themselves. Think about the different skin and eye colors. Are you really going to say that having a Barbie whose skin tone matches that of a multi-ethnic little girl is a bad thing? No, people shouldn’t blame all their body image issues on dolls. But that doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t have representation in their toys.