Barbie Can Be Anything, Even A Firestarter

Barbie is supposed to be a firefighter, not the arsonist lighting the inferno. But, here we are. Barbie really can be anything.

 

Barbie, the doll, has a fair share of controversy to begin with. Diversity and body image being two of the big discussion points. Mattel has been working to address these issues for decades, attempting a true realization of her tagline. With the new movie’s release though, more controversy has been added to the Dream house doorstep.

 

There was no other outcome in today’s social climate. Certain people were going to be upset. Even if Greta Gerwig has tiptoed on eggshells, something would have been offensive. Just ask the Green M&M who dared to change her shoes.

 

How did Barbie stir up more controversy? Relegating Ken to a supporting character,  ensuring  the subset of  woefully insecure men with little to no emotional awareness were butt hurt. It’s anti-men. It’s degrading. It’s too pro-women.

 

First, anyone who has either watched children play with Barbies, played with the dolls themselves, or merely rummaged through a toy bin will tell you that Ken is a supporting character. In any random Barbie bin, you might find two Kens to a legion of Barbies. We just didn’t need more than one or two Kens to fulfill our playtime.

 

Second, Barbie and her vibrant packaging underscores the division between the “girl isles” and “boy isles” in toy stores.  She has been marketed exclusively to girls for decades. There’s a deep rooted stigma  around boys playing with Barbies. I remember a neighbor’s uncle being furious with his son for daring to play with the dolls. When I say furious, I mean red-faced with an inability to speak coherent sentences. While I want to believe this has changed, I’m not so sure it has given the turmoil the movie has stirred up.

 

What, then, were they expecting given the subject matter?

 

Their expectation was, at the very least, that Ken would have a seat at the table, because he’s male presenting. They wanted Ken to swoop in and be Barbie’s savior. They are so used to everything being created for and targeted at them, that they are unable to process the notion of not being the target audience.

 

I know this. You know this. But it is fascinating and infuriating that these men expect a leading role in a movie about a doll they bar their sons from playing with.

 

In a perfect world, this indignation and outrage on the part of these men would lead to a revelation. If they don’t like seeing a male presenting doll being relegated to a position where their value is tied to their supposed love interest’s notice, then maybe women don’t like being consistently assigned that role either.

 

But enough on that. We do not live in a perfect world. Their outrage has taken up enough space on this page. And on the Internet as a whole, I might add. Male rage wasn’t the only fire Gerwig’s Barbie has ignited, it’s just the one lit near a powder keg. The other fires are the ones we all be should be talking about. They should be the conversations in the spot light.

 

Barbie, for all my bitching about the toy aisle division, has always been targeted primarily at girls. Her motto aims to remind each generation that girls, not just Barbie, can be anything. Bringing the plastic icon to the silver screen breathed life into a toy and rekindled something in the film’s target demographic. 

 

It’s not every day someone puts Virginia Woolf and Barbie in the same conversation, but Gerwig’s Barbie amplifies the point Woolf makes in A Room of One’s Own. The Barbies in Barbieland have their own dreamhouses, careers, and they dress to please themselves and no one else. They have the space to just be what they want. I doubt Woolf’s vision included a Malibu Beach House bedecked in hot pink and glitter,  but,she might have if hot pink was a thing then.

 

The freedom to create and exist for oneself that Barbieland represents is something that women don’t necessarily have in the real world. It’s something that’s been put down in favor of conforming to society’s absurd standards. See the speech from the character of Gloria (America Ferrera) in this film if you are unfamiliar with the contradictory values women have to live up to. The surge of Barbiecore in everything from fashion to home decor underlines how much women want to reconnect to that mindset. That space where we were the narrators and creators of our own world.

 

The film’s massive box office take highlights that, too.  More importantly, the box office numbers show the target demographic’s buying power. Barbie has soared past the billion-dollar mark, outshining many uber-popular superhero movies. You would think that much money would light a fire under an industry struggling to stay afloat, right? Yes, Warner Brothers and Mattel have announced there’s more to come in the wake of this movie’s smash success. Polly Pocket, Hot Wheels, and more are set to make their debut on the silver screen.

 

This response shows not everyone is reading the room correctly. I could sit here and try to come up with better words, but Randall Park hit the nail on the head in his interview with Rolling Stone, and I don’t see the point in reinventing the wheel. Park’s interview speaks to the larger diversity problem, but the example of Barbie highlights the short-sightedness of the industry. Scorsese has a point about the current trajectory of cinema, but if the industry were to really evaluate the success of Barbie, perhaps it could be pulled back from the edge.