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An Argument for Barbie's Feminism

Barbie is almost always criticized by feminists, who claim that Barbie exemplifies the kind of compulsory heterosexuality, white imperialism, and oppressive patriarchy that feminists so hate. These claims aren't just based on suppositions, but more so on the heap of ethnographic research conducted amongst Mattel's consumers. Barbie is a household name, having been a computer engineer, astronaut, rockstar, doctor, and even a presidential candidate. Over the last few years, Mattel has given Barbie a woke new makeover fit for the 21st century. I don't doubt for even a second that Mattel's re-invigoration of Barbie is motivated by anything but a consumerist need for more profit, but that doesn't mean that she isn't a feminist. One can have skewed motivations for their feminism, whilst still existing in a space that benefits and benefits and uplifts women. One of their latest adverts really does exemplify Mattel's newfound liberalism - and pulls on my heartstrings. 

The advertisement opens with college students filling a lecture hall whilst text flashes across the screen, reading "what happens when girls are free to imagine they can be anything?" The students, who appear to be being filmed without them knowing, are delighted when their teacher dons the floor and she's a very young girl. Hello, my name is Gwyneth,” she says adorably as the students laugh, “and I will be your professor today.” A veterinarian, a football coach, a tour guide, a businesswoman, the young girls fulfil all of these jobs as the adults around them indulge them. In truth, the girls are playing the parts well. At the end of the advert, the young professor is not, in fact, lecturing her hall of students, but in her bedroom, pretending that her Barbie is teaching neuroscience to an assertion of other dolls. 

Jessica Valenti, a journalist for The Guardian, argues that the advert screams that girls can be anything, "Except fat, of course. Or not white." and I'd agree - I mean Barbie has only made a couple of black Barbies, the first being called "Colored Francie," certainly a name very of-the-time. However, just because Mattel used to be fatphobic and exclusionary of black women, doesn't mean they still are. In 2021, they released a new advert, which starts with the image of a blonde and blue-eyed Barbie's face set behind the text "This is Barbie," before the screen splits and shows a brown-skinned Barbie with brown hair and a prosthetic leg next to a black Barbie with denser hair and vitiligo. The camera continues to pan across a range of different Barbies, displaying everything that Barbie 'is.' A prominent Barbie official stated, "We are proud that Barbie is the most diverse doll line on the market that continues to evolve to better reflect the world girls see around them."

50 years ago, the whole institution of feminism was racist, fatphobic, and exclusively heterosexual. To some extent, that's still what feminism is. Just because Mattel used to be terrible, and just because Barbie used to be an anti-feminist institution, doesn't mean she can't be more than that, now, today. 

07/12/2021

by Frankie E.J. Robinson

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