Barbie is Not a Sex Symbol

Barbie is Not a Sex Symbol

Barbie, America's number one selling doll, was not a sex symbol. With the aid of a child's imagination, she could be -and do- anything a child wanted. Barbie has endured through decades of social and political upheaval -not to mention the countless attacks by feminists. How did she do it? By staying abreast of the times and by employing some of the savviest marketing in American business history. Barbie is sold in more than 140 countries, accounts for 38 percent of Mattel's sales, and has had more than 500 make overs in her career.

It all started when Ruth Handler noticed her daughter Barbara playing with paper dolls and imagining them in grown up roles. Ruth realized that dolls on the market at the time were all baby dolls. She also realized that there was a need for a doll that would inspire little girls to think about what they wanted to be when they grew up. Thus Ruth came up with the idea for the teenage fashion model, Barbie, whom she named after her daughter.

Barbie has more clothes in her closet than some small department stores. She can be anything from a doctor to an airplane pilot. Barbie can be black, white, or Asian; have brown, blue, or green eyes; and have blond, brown, black, or red hair. Barbie, through her amazing ability to morph before one's eyes, gave young people a chance to expand their horizons by showing that race or sex was not a factor in one's future.

When Barbie was first introduced in 1959, the Women's Movement was just gaining momentum. In a time when women were stay-at-home wives, Barbie was out skiing or perhaps nursing a sick foal back to health. Forty years later, Barbie has her own Corvette and motor home, dream house, and website where you c...

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...in situations that occurred in my everyday life, and I put Barbie in my dreams. Through her, I could go anywhere I desired, but I could also put Barbie back on a shelf after playtime. In her essay, Prager says that, in movies, women are always topless and men are always covered because of Barbie. Topless women and covered men were not novelties in 1959, nor are they in 1999. One doll did not account for the events both before and after her creation.

The insinuation that, if a man made Barbie, then all things were explained is ridiculous. Barbie was not made by a man, and was not made in the image of a man's perfect woman. She was formed to give a young girl a realistic idea of her future, not necessarily in looks, but in her ability to do what she fantasized most about. Barbie was not made to be a sex symbol. She was created to make dreams seem possible.