Tiny Shoulders, Rethinking Barbie

Barbie is a way of the past. No one needs this "brand" to show young women what they should be today. Tiny Shoulders is a lesson in bed marketing. Get it right.

Stupid movie! it's a doll! I don't think that playing with a pretty doll makes you feel bad or better about yourself. Barbie, if anything shows little girls they can be anything when they grow up. Like a doctor, flight attendant, bee keeper, veterinarian, dentist, astronaut. The movie was basically about people who don't like the way they look blame it on a doll.

If you wanted to watch a Barbie film with feminist talking heads and multiple mentions of "white supremacy" this is it. For me it was just interesting to see just how far off the mark certain types still were, ideology warping their understanding of basic realities.

Yes there are beauty standards. Academics have tried to deny this pointing to historic art painted for the pretentious rich of their day which like todays elites and their obsession with modern art is not representative of any wider norm. Go look up Michelangelo's Pieta for the honest reality that beauty has always been idealized. When creating art to glorify god not only is the mother of Jesus depicted as beautiful, but she is unrealistically young.

One should note the concern over body shaming coincides with an epidemic of obesity, so the assumption behind the concern is questionable as the protection from standards leads to undeniable real world harm far greater than hurt feelings. Its notable in asian cultures where obesity is far less common, body shaming is actually common.

The concern over eating disorders was one of the original pieces of "fake news". The statistics were fabricated, as were the reasons. All the elaborate explanations cultural and psychological were false, in real cases its simply a feminine form of OCD. Originally seen in religious form when afflicted nuns would starve themselves to be closer to god.

The pernicious use of childrens toys to indoctrinate should really stop, it doesn't work and those who push extreme ideologies denouncing such toys usually are the example of how their own ideologies are the true danger. Roxane Gay, Gloria Steinem, the bitter critiques of the permanently childless when they are the living examples of the wrongness of their ideas.

Maybe the lesson to women is that they should stop over thinking things. There is no similar documentary or concern over male toys like GI Joe or He-man, fantasy is fantasy. It' s even more disturbing once you realize that boys toys depict the selfless, while feminist toys depict the selfish. The feminist narrative has always been an inversion of reality.

Interesting primarily from a marketing perspective. A story about good timing, a tenacious founder, and a chance encounter in Germany with a doll named Lil (sold in service stations and marketed to men!) gives way to a drearily self-important discourse in sociology. Yes, fine, Barbie was culturally relevant and yes this is a great big advertisement for woke mattel products. Guaranteed to give any survivors of corporate america (particularly in marketing & PR) severe agita. Trigger alert: Mattel employees with severe upspeak, vocal trill, and tragic buzz word addiction. 90 minutes seems like 4 hours.

Obviously u folks spewing all this negativity towards this doc never played with dolls. I thought it was a really good, necessary watch. People saying "it's just a doll" never had insecurities or body image issues. Although I wished for more interviews with children, since their opinions mattered most with this subject matter, it was nice to hear from actual Mattel employees. I also enjoyed learning a little about the founding couple behind the brand, especially Ruth, who was a bad chick. Barbie has meant so much to women/girls the last 60+ years so as a progressive figure she was long overdue for a relaunch. I think she still has a ways to go to be more inclusive and to keep the attention of kids, but think it's a step in the right direction.

I do believe society has placed too much pressure on a doll, however since Barbie is in the public eye, there's a certain level of responsibility that entails.