Barbie's Barbie-The Ultimate Standard

The Ultimate Standard

Since 1959, Barbie’s lifestyle has served as a template of how young girls should live the remainder of their life. Certainly, Barbie is just a plastic doll, but she stands a plastic queen. Consequently, Young girls obliviously see her as an idol, and every doll that was made after Barbie is a carbon copy of her. Being that Barbie’s image remains impossible to acquire, some mothers do not allow their children to play with her; they do not want their “baby girls” thinking they are not good enough. Barbie has influenced young girls into thinking that the only way to be perfect is to grow up striving to be just like the blonde hair, blue eyed white woman with the perfect body figure.

The prominent image that Barbie presents

is blonde hair, blue eyes, and white. Obviously, every girl does not get the opportunity to look like this; however this does not stop them from desiring to be. Mattel (the toy company that produced Barbie) created Barbie in more than 40 different nationalities over the years, but those dolls do not have the same value as the original Barbie. According Alicia Perez, a Walmart in Louisiana marked down black Barbie, a doll that is identical to the original Barbie except for the skin color. This makes young girls of other races feel like they have less value than white girls. African American girls, especially, begin to feel as if their skin color is not beautiful compared to those girl who are white. Perez states, “Devaluing the black doll leads to young black girls devaluing themselves, by regarding the black doll as “ugly” and thus internalizing that hatred”. They begin to feel as if they have to work harder to get what white girls have for the rest of their life. Of course, Barbie is not intended to have this effect on little girls, this naturally occurs when the idolized doll just happens to be prominently made with white skin for many years. Barbie’s image has been affecting little girls for a multitude of years.
It is frightening to see how easily young girls can be influenced by Barbie’s size, their self-esteem decreases and so does their calorie intake. Barbie is known for having the perfect hourglass body figure. According to Sasha Goldstein, writer for New York daily news, states “One of the first editions of the doll, Slumber Party Barbie, even came with a doll-size ‘How to lose weight’ book with only ‘Don’t eat!’ written inside and a scale permanently stuck at 110 pounds”. Her bust is larger than her waist, and her waist is thinner than her hips. These impossible measurements can be undoubtedly seen on Barbie. Goldstein says, “Barbie is anatomically impossible and would be reduced to walking on all fours and incapable of lifting anything”. Society pressures females to aim to look like Barbie, something that is literally impossible. Some women such as, Valeria Lukyanova, even get numerous plastic surgeries to look more similar to Barbie. Once again, Barbie is not intended to make girls feel this way, and girls often do not think of Barbie while harming their bodies in order to get her shape; but if there is any one thing that wraps up what society wants in women, that one thing would be a Barbie doll. Girls are not aware that one doll has changed their view on life since they were young.
Barbie has influenced young girls into believing that the blonde hair, blue eyed white woman with the perfect body figure is the definition of beauty. Involuntarily, the original Barbie is the ultimate standard of the ideal American woman. Her varying skin colors do not help girls of different races view themselves positively in comparison to white girls; and even though having Barbie’s image is impossible, some girls harm themselves in the process of trying. Who knew buying a little girl a toy could change her view of herself?