Photo: Adam Cuerden
When I was growing up, the hour-glass figure in women was idolized. When articles were written about beauty queens, they gave their measurements. The ideal was 36-inch bust, 24-inch waist, and 36-inch waist.
As a teen, I had the 24-inch waist, but not the other ones.
When Barbie dolls came along in the 1960s, I was appalled. Why teach girls that their bodies should look like Barbie’s? Why have her feet permanently shaped to fit into high heels? Why make her blond and blue-eyed?
Almost all women don’t look like that.
When my daughters were born in the 1960s, I refused to buy them Barbie dolls.
However, I did buy them a doll that had long blond hair that you could pull her short hair and make it longer, then roll it back up to be short again. She didn’t have an hour-glass figure and she had regular feet.
Barbie was copied from a doll Ruth Handler, pictured above in 1961, found in Germany. Handler cofounded Mattel with her husband, Elliott. The Bild Lilli doll was a risqué gag gift for men based upon a cartoon character featured in the West German newspaper Bild Zeitung. In the comics, Lilli was witty, irreverent, and sexually uninhibited. The doll was sold in tobacco shops and adult stores.
Jack Ryan, a designer who’s credited as the creator of the Barbie doll, said when the prototypes of Barbie kept coming from Japan, the dolls had nipples, according to an article on National Public Radio. His job was to take a fine Swiss file, which were used on watches, and file the nipples off.
Although the Barbie brand has had steady sales in recent years, for the first six months of 2023 the Barbie brand had a 23 percent decline from the same time period in 2022, according to the Insider website.
With the Barbie movie and all the hype, sales will probably increase.
I find all the Barbie hype really discouraging. It’s bad enough that millions of girls play with these dolls – that have a body shape that’s unrealistic – every day for years. Now, we all have to suffer with so many articles and ads about Barbie and the movie. Even two of my favorite newspapers, The New York Times and The Washington, have had article after article on Barbie. It’s disappointing that even reputable newspapers are adding to the Barbie frenzy.
As for “Barbie,” the movie, some reviewers are talking about its feminist moments with Barbie, and Ken following along, going to the human world to try to understand herself and discover her true purpose.
I hope “Barbie” doesn’t get nominated for an Academy Award for set design or sound. That’s the only reason I’d see it. I write about the Academy Award movies each year, so if it’s nominated I’d watch it.
