I consider Barbie dangerous. This is not because
of some immature-eww-girls-have-cooties thing that I have. I
believe that Barbie actually infects the minds of young girls and causes
them to become simpering mallrats.
Consider: Barbie has no visible job, aside from
short stints as a ballerina, racecar driver, and nurse (apparently
one must only have blond hair and blue eyes to succeed at these jobs)
and yet she spends most of her waking hours in a mall! She leeches
everything she owns from her boyfriend Ken. Ken's job has never been
specified; we only know that it is enough to pay for cosmetic surgery,
a Ferrari, a dreamhouse, and of course Barbie's daily
shopping sprees. Only two jobs that I know of pay that kind of cash:
neurosurgeon and crack dealer. Since there's never been a "Totally Doctor
Ken" (Neurosurgeon has far too many syllables,) we must assume that
Ken is a dealer. Thought: Totally Druglord Ken?
So we see Barbie's problems beginning: Bulemic, brainless, topheavy,
anatomically impossible, and on top of it all, she's married to a crack
dealer.
Another problem that I have with Barbie is that she is
far too close to Hitler's idea of the Aryan master race; I know that there
was an African-American Barbie, but she was
basically "Totally Melanin Barbie." Even the non-Caucasian Barbies
look suspiciously white.
As I said before, Barbie bears a suspicious resemblance
to Hitler's idea of the master race, as does Ken. (Can't you just see
an army of Barbie and Ken droids populating the planet?)
As
cosmetic surgery gets better and cheaper, we have seen more and more
women (and men) mutilating themselves in the name of beauty, at least
Mattel's idea of beauty, getting themselves identically
plasticated and dyed until they become faceless Barbie clones,
without a thought in their heads (except, perhaps, for
"Hey! Let's go to the Mall!")
Ken, thankfully, has not yet invaded society to the extent that
Barbie has, but I do see startlingly Ken-like models in cologne and tie ads.
It's only a matter of time before
everyone buys Barbie, and everyone wants to
grow up to be just like Barbie or Ken, and everyone
watches the same TV shows, and everyone buys the same products,
and everyone wears the same clothes. While Barbie seems to be
a contemporary female, she is in fact promoting the same housewife ideals
as she did in the 1950s.
UPDATE
According to an article in the New York Times, Mattel is planning to introduce
"Smart Barbies." My reaction was best described by the column's author, Maureen
Dowd: "Making Barbie smart is like making G.I. Joe a conscientious objector."
I couldn't have put it better myself.
Among the Smart Barbies is the (ugh) computer-literate Barbie,
which comes with a neon-pepto-bismol-intestinal-pink computer.
Also in the "Smart" Barbies is College Barbie--she's a cheerleader (God
knows how she's getting through college--my guess is, she's on the
"Dean's list")
Also coming out is "Totally Marilyn Monroe" Barbie; that seemed a little
redundant to me. (I also find it odd that Mattel's idea of a role model is a
bimbo actress who died of an OD)
I find it odd that Mattel tries to make Barbie politically correct, considering
that the original Barbie was modeled on a German "adult doll"
(Really! What more proof do you need?)
Recently, I needed to get a couple Barbie images off the 'net for the
Barbie/roach picture (you can find it in the Gallery.)
To get the images, I ran a Net Search for "Barbie images," and I found 30,000 matches.
75% of the ones that I read were pages written by 45-year-old men with no life,
men who have actually devoted entire rooms of their apartment to their Barbies,
men who their mothers refer to as "awkward," men who have no friends except for their cats,
and probably even their cats hope that they die soon. I feel sorry for these people.
For a person to spend the money for a web server and a constant connection
*
so that they can inflict their Barbies on the internet community...they have to be very very
sick people. Actual quote from one of these pages: "And then on the top shelf
is my Ballerina Barbie. She's from the first Ballerina Barbie series. Isn't she pretty?
Someday I may actually remove her from the box, even though that would decrease the value...
I hope that this will be the year that Skipper becomes a teenager!" (If you care
about such things, first, I pity you, and second, Mattel says she will.)
On a slightly relevant note, my friends and I were tossing around ideas for the
Aryan master race Barbies, and I came up with "Totally Hitler-Jügend Skipper." Also
"Totally Gestapo Ken, with goose-stepping action."
Whenever my friends and I see a show/product/ad that reminds us of BarbieLand,
we say "Wow. Barbie Conspiracy." A frightening amount of TV is Barbie Conspiracy: MTV, Fox,
most movies; even TV news has Barbie-clone anchordroids. This must be stopped!
Therefore, I am starting an orginization: The Society for the De-Barbification of America.
If you want to join, send me mail: enki_1@yahoo.com
with your name and proposed title (for example, I am Enki, Boy Wonder and El Presidente.)
UPDATE II
It has come to my attention that Mattel is making Spice Girl Barbies.
I object to using Barbie as a role model for girls, but even if you do,
consider: the Spice Girls are a bunch of talentless, admitted ex-prostitutes who wouldn't
know "girl power" if it was stapled to their plastic faces.
Also: It has come to my attention that Mattel is releasing slightly more
realistic Barbies. In that vein, here are a couple suggestions, with more to follow:
Really realistic Barbies:
- Totally Teen Pregnancy Skipper
- Totally Unfit Mother Barbie