Barbie

Not evil.

If the general way you're raising the sozlet is solid (and i'm pretty sure it is), Barbie will just be another toy in her world.

I had one, maybe 2 real Barbies, and a couple of faux Barbies. I drove them around in a little plastic jeep (probably my all time favourite toy, that red plastic jeep), made them clothes, yadda yadda. I don't think they had an impact on my social or political development.

I know the advertising around them is different now, but I still see that parenting is what has real effect on the children I know.

I dated girls in high school who cut the hair and limbs off of their Barbies and dressed them in bondage gear. Those were the coolest chicks on the block....you are clearly a good parent, so Barbie schmarbie....you know what you're doing.

From your stories about the sozlet, I think she is already turning into a way-cool kid. I am certain she will be just fine under your guidance, Barbies or not.

Letty has a related thread going, dealing with Razanne, a modestly dressed Muslim doll.

http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=13461

In the '60's I was passionately and vocally against the Barbie Doll. I even tried to boycott other Matel products when I was shopping for boy toys. Barbie represented frivolous, brainless womanhood with an unrealistic figure and an impractical wardrobe.

Two years ago a fringe member of Mr. Noddy's family, invited us to a birthday party for a four-year-old. Barbies were specified as the only acceptable gift.

I mentioned this double affront (assigned Barbies! to my daughter-in-law who retorted that she and her friends had loved playing Barbies and their Barbies had all sorts of adventures. Like G.I. Joe, Barbie was an action doll.

For years I've read about Barbie inspiring anorexia in sensitive teenagers.
If this is so, why are 66% American's overweight?


As a dear, sweet, little old lady in tennis shoes, my primary objection to Barbie these days is the shoddy quality of her clothes and accessories. Also, while I haven't checked, I suspect Barbie's wardrobe and artifacts are made in sweatshops overseas.

I'm against the loving parents who buy the new Barbies, year after year, for their daughters and store them up high, unplayed with to preserve their value as collector's items.

Mature wisdom: Barbie's value is in the eye of the beholder. I can't imagine that the Sozlet lives in a world where dressing and undressing are the most fascinating parts of her day and dressing and undressing are the only play activities she can some up with--ever.

Thanks for the votes of confidence! Much appreciated. I'm sure that it will ensure that she will be a holy terror for her appearance at the Madison gathering.

Noddy, the Barbie party thing is just... wrong. Blech.

I think the body image/ overweight thing is not necessarily unrelated -- when normal but not rail-thin girls feel they are too fat, and start a diet-binge cycle or just generally obsess about food and weight, that can in fact lead to obesity later. As opposed to the not-rail-thin girls just kind of accepting that not-rail-thinness is OK.

However, I don't think those things are necessarily related, either.

I think that if the sozlet shows an interest in a dress-up doll, I'd tend toward one of the more girly ones. There is a series I've seen at the local bookstore that I can't recall the name of -- they have lots of cool outfits but are soft fabric with yarn hair and girl bodies.

I don't think I'll outlaw Barbie, but I won't go out of my way to buy it/her for the sozlet, either.

Cav's girlfriend's Barbies:

Heres my opinion, if you give your child the confidence and encoragement they need that is how they are going to acy a peice of plastic will not govern what they think of themselves if they are being made feel good by the ppl around them. If you want those polly pocket things ask my wife I swear she has every 1 ever made.....think she wants a girl? lol

PS. soz I just remembered I was suposed to do that plan for you I have been so busy with work and school s well as family time it slipped my mind i will do it asap.

No worries, safecracker, I recently joined a gym and have a free session with a personal trainer to come up with a plan. Whoo-hoo!

Hmmm.. I think pretty much all of my sisters had Barbie's at one point or another. I distinctly remember one sister sitting 4 or 5 of them in a car that I had as a kid, filling the whole thing with gasoline and sending it down the street (we lived on a good sized hill..) in flames.

I don't think any of them to were to affected by Barbie's unnatural build in the end.

soz I don't like personal trainers, most of them have very lil know how, ask them about HIIT if they don't know what it is or mistake it for HIT tell them to go back to school. I actually just got done teaching a nutrition class at a local college.

What the hell was that cjhsa ? Now that I think about it, the Barbie scenes may have been sicker....also, I once had to cater a Barbie party for a grown woman once, named Barbara, a party planner and apparently a Barbie fan. All the food had to be pink, and served on Barbie platters. I wanted to puke.

Just be glad she hasn't found out about American Girl dolls yet!!! They're very nice, very expensive and an obession once the catalogues start coming to your house every month.

My daughter was finished with Barbies by the time she was 7. They're cheaply made and the hair turns into a fright sight after they're played with a few times.

When I was a kid, I had one Barbie and one Ken. I drew the nipples on her breasts and played with her until I was about 11.
she had outfits my grandmother made for her, and we used to have Barbie marathons in the yard, my friends and I.

Nowadays kids aren't into them as much. They get tired of them because of all the other toys they can have. so I wouldn't worry about Barbie as a bad influence.

I always loved barbie when I was little. I remember going into the toy stores and checking out all the accessories for them and thought they were so cool. I see nothing wrong with them at all. My friends and I use to spend hours playing with them and it was a lot of fun to change their outfits and pretend they were going to all kinds of places.

It's pretty easy to control what kind of toys your child plays with at the age of 3, sozobe. Just wait 'til she starts school! Then she'll want what everyone else has.

I was determined not to give toy weapons (guns, etc.) to my son. That worked until he was about 5. Then he started picking up sticks or anything lying around and pretending they were guns & swords. All my good work for nothing.

I have a friend who said "no Barbies" until her kindergartener came home and started calling her Madame Alexander dolls "Barbies." And then cried in front of a friend's mother and told her that "my mom won't let me have real Barbies like Emily." So the two girls played with Barbies every time they were at the friend's house. Eventually she relented.

Be grateful she's 3. It gets worse.

I was trying to explain A2K to someone earlier today - threw this in as an example of the things that are mixed in with word association and politics. The woman I was speaking to said not to worry. Her 3 sons played with Barbies and Teenage Mutuant Ninja Turtles. She said she was told her sons would either grow up to be gay and/or violent. Nothin' doing. She says if you're a good mom (which you must be, cuz you're thinking about things) the sozlet will be fine.

If the sozlet is going to be a girly-girl, she will. If she isn't already going to be, she won't. Those are the sage words of my colleague (mother of sons 14, 18 and 19).

The sozlet is SO going to be a girly-girl. We were just talking about this at dinner. Actually she seems to be very much in the same mold as I was -- I would wear my favorite red with white polka-dotted ruffled leotard, matching skirt, and matching red hairbow to do bike jumps with the boys in the alley or play tackle football. Fashion -- total girl. Attitude -- tomboy.

Eva, yeah, I know it's gonna get worse. (Eek) That's why I'm trying to figure things out now, though... I dislike having to make split-second decisions in a crisis, and I can see a crisis ("I WANT a Barbie!!!") looming. So I'm trying to figure out my thinking ahead of time.

This has helped a lot, thanks!

(Just noticed my avatar next to my post... I really loved that polka-dotted outfit, maybe that's part of my affection for Rosie.)

it's not what they play with but what they are taught by their parents. For example ehBeth, by trying to make your son not play with toy guns you are giving him the perception that guns are bad.....not a good idea. I started shooting when I was 5 and was taught and suprovised properly..with real guns not just toys. I always understood the way guns are shown in the media and movies is wrong. I enlisted and saved more lives then I took so that shows its not the toy but the image we give to associate with that toy.

Mrs. cav went to a shooting range once to do some research for some writing she's doing. One thing she learned quickly, that 'gangsta-style' holding the gun sideways thing looks great on film, but is highly impractical, and nearly impossible.