BARBIE DOLL LOVE

I have always loved Barbie.  Check out her first commercial. 

I was so disappointed when my nieces lost interest in Barbie at a very young age.  They were more into $100 American Girl dolls that sat on shelves because they were too expensive to play with.  Oh, and those ugly BRATZ dolls!

I had Barbie and her friend, Midge.  I never had a Ken doll.  My parents bought me Allan instead.  Allan was created to be Ken’s best friend and Midge’s boyfriend.  In my world Allan was Barbie’s boyfriend.  Midge was just the side-kick with no man of her own. 

I’ll confess -- when I was 13 years old I would tiptoe down the basement to sneak in some playtime with Barbie.  I would have died of embarrassment if any of my friends had caught me, but I just wasn’t ready to give up Barbie and her friends. 

At 13 you’re part child/part grown-up.  I was child enough to play with Barbie; adult enough to make Barbie a whore.  While Allan went to work, my Barbie was visited by Johnny West.   He was my brother Tommy’s long-forgotten cowboy doll, and quite a hunk. 

Eventually I packed away my dolls along with their clothes and accessories in my vintage Barbie case.  The next time I saw my beloved Barbie was when I was about 20.  I came home from work to find an open, broken case, Barbie clothes and one-inch pink plastic stilettos strewn all over the driveway.  Just outside the garage was a massacre of naked and decapitated dolls. 

The Barbie Doll Murderer, as he became known, was my 8 year old brother Michael.  The Allan doll was discontinued in 1965 and is worth about $65 today.  I have no idea how much Barbie would be worth – that last year with Johnny West was rough on her.

So it kind of ruffles Aunt Annie's feathers when I see that on the Today Show there was a woman who made a life-size Barbie doll to "raise awareness of eating disorders."  She said she suffered from anorexia when she was a cheerleader in high school.  So she is skinny AND popular -- I already hate her! 

The doll stands six feet tall with a 39-inch bust, 18-inch waist and 33-inch hips and is supposed to depict Barbie, if she were human, I guess.  

“I’m not blaming Barbie [for my illness] — she’s one small factor, an environmental factor,” Slayen said. “I’m blond and blue-eyed and I figured that was what I was supposed to look like. She was my idol.  It impacted the way I looked at myself.”

Yeah, sure, you’re not blaming Barbie.  Mattel’s answer, via email, was basically “the doll was never modeled on the proportions of a real person.” 

Good thing I don’t work for Mattel

“What the hell is wrong with you people?  It’s a f*&king doll that’s been around for over fifty f*&king years.  If you want to look like Barbie you're one messed up little kid.”

Even Yale and Duke Universities got into it.  Studies agree on the measurements, give or take a few inches on the waist.  They say she would not be able to hold up her head, would have to crawl on all fours due to her legs and feet, wouldn’t be able to menstruate and would have many medical problems.

Aren't there other studies to be done?  Perhaps find cures for cancer, AIDS, autism and so many other serious diseases and conditions.

All this criticism of Barbie makes me think.



No one has said shit to Bill Cosby about Fat Albert. 
Maybe HE's the cause behind this OBESITY EPIDEMIC! 
AHA! 

HEY HEY HEY

 “I’m not blaming Fat Albert — he’s one small factor.  He was my idol.  It impacted the way I looked at myself.”