Why Is Barbie Doll Too Sexualized

The object under consideration is the barbie doll. A barbie doll is a toy for children who have moved on from developmental toys to more sophisticated toys. Barbie doll fit an unrealistic size and shape figured doll that kids can play with in various ways. They can play dress up and do different things due to barbie having multiple careers paths she is able to take. It does promote a positive image to young girls because it promotes the idea that you can be anything you want to be, however, it still plants the idea of an unrealistic body image. Barbie is slender and tall and barbie dolls do not deviate from thing and this is problematic because it creates a certain kind of standard young girls begin to believe in.

Young girls playing with Bratz dolls is not an ideal situation because the doll teaches them how to make themselves look more sexualized. This plastic doll is only six inches in length, much shorter then it’s competitor Barbie, but it still holds much more impact on a child. With very voluminous hair and outrageous makeup such as eyeshadow, lipstick, and mascara, little girls are being exposed to something that they should not have to experience until they are in their teens. The dolls lead young girls to think

Young girls have been playing with Barbie dolls since the dolls inception at the American International Toy Fair in New York. Recently, researchers have been skeptical on whether the dolls have an effect on the self-image of girls who play with them. In order to determine if Barbies have an impact on young-girls self-concept, clinicians have carried out several studies where they monitor the interaction between the young girls and the famous figurine. From these experiments, scientists concluded that Barbies can have a bearing on a girls self-image, making the consumers who buy the doll more aware of the issue Barbie

Picture yourself as the ‘perfect’ woman. Embodying every woman’s dream. You are undeniably gorgeous, weighing in at 100 pounds, standing 6 feet tall and holding nearly 150 careers (barbiemedia.com). Yes, this is the beloved, ever so ‘inspirational’ childhood toy, the perfectly perfect Barbie Doll. Barbie is America’s most beloved toy, considering young girls between the ages of three and eleven own at least 10 Barbie’s throughout their childhood (‘Life in Plastic’). As creator of the Barbie Doll once said, “My whole philosophy of Barbie was that through the doll, the little girl could be anything she wanted to be. Barbie always represented that a woman has choices,” (Handler). However, Barbie has proved to serve the opposite effect and

Emily Prager, in Our Barbies, Ourselves, stated that Barbies have influenced little girls around the world on what the perfect body looks like, when in reality there is no “perfect” body. Our Barbies, Ourselves states “here are millions of women who are

has conformed to their societal standards. Although she has gained society's approval, she has lost herself. Growing up, this is something that most everyone can relate too.

Perfect, gorgeous, attractive and dazzling: Barbie has continued to dominate global toy sales for the past five decades – she is the purest paragon. However, contrary to widespread belief, Barbie may be the worst thing to have ever damned society, along with its ever-expanding population. Sensible adults may understand that Barbie’s physique is unattainable, as well as being an unrealistic depiction of a woman’s body, but is Barbie completely harmless to young girls? Or are her effects far more incessant, and deep-rooted, than society wishes to believe? Since 1959, Barbie has ‘supposedly’ brought immense joy to young girls across the planet via her delectable career paths, and fashion taste. Yet coming through the beginning of the 21st Century, Barbie has come under fire by the public, and by leading experts on whether her unrealistically proportioned body is truly healthy for a child to interact with. Barbie is the lingering, systematic sexism of the 1950s, still crawling in our gutters – so, is it time for some modernisation, or should this psychologically damaging doll be abandoned forever?

Society should be involved up to a certain point, and should have more realistic figures to inspire the youth. Barbie, an unrealistically proportioned doll, should not be the inspiration for the youth, yet it has been a cultural icon since 1959 (Source E). Since 1959, society has been focusing on the woman's figure and overlooked the problem of depression, body loathing, and low self-esteem. Society puts too much pressure, both mental and

Since it was first introduced to U.S. toy markets back in 1959 (Abramson 2009), the commercially successful Barbie doll has historically solidified its legacy in American consumer culture. It is every little girl’s rite of passage to be old enough to finally receive a Barbie. Although the gifting of a Barbie can be an exciting moment for children, its effects on their body images can leave lasting detrimental damage to their self-esteem. These damages often manifest themselves in multidimensional ways, with eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia, being highly common examples. It may seem incredulous one doll can engender so much turmoil in a child’s life, but several developmental psychologists have demonstrated that the unrealistic body expectations espoused by Barbie have permanent implications for young girls’ developmental trajectories.

It wasn’t until the late 1960’s that critics began “comparing Barbie to a Playboy Bunny and calling her a corrupter of youth” (”Bad Girl” 3). One woman commented, “She’s an absurd representation of what a woman should be” (“Bad Girl” 3)-–and that’s exactly what many others thought she was, too. With such impossible real-life measurements of 5’9” tall, 36”-18”-33” bust, waist, and hip (Benstock and Ferriss 35), it’s easy to see why mothers across the country banned the doll from their homes and refused to let their impressionable young daughters be influenced by a piece of painted plastic (Bestock and Ferriss 35). Since dolls have often been responsible for teaching children what society deems important or beautiful, many concerned parents wondered why Mattel did not design a doll that taught more valuable lessons than dressing pretty and being dangerously skinny (Edut 19)? Who said a runway model was best suited for teaching a child what is beautiful anyway? “According to a Mattel spokesperson, a Kate Moss figure is better suited for today’s fashions” (Edut 19), and that is one reason why Barbie must be so disproportional. Actually, another reason for Barbie’s anorexic figure can be traced back long before Kate Moss and the fashion runway. Barbie was

Millions of girls around the world are dressing their Barbie dolls in skimpy designer outfits and high heel shoes, and slide her slender legs into a bright pink convertible next to her male counterpart, Ken. These same girls will gaze into the mirror, staring at their thighs and hair, and attempt to balance themselves in a pair of their mother’s high heel shoes. They will wonder why they do not look like Barbie. They will wonder today, just as I wondered years ago. As the years of make-believe with the American plastic icon of girlhood nostalgia passed, I discovered Barbie’s hidden effects. Although Barbie lent herself to fond memories of childhood, she also influenced my early ideal image of the female body. As I began to realize

The Effect of Experimental Exposure to Images of Dolls on the Body Image of 5- to 8-Year-Old Girls. This scholarly article explains how girls are pressured to be thin because of the dolls they play with and society’s influences. Barbie dolls represent an “ultrathin” body type that most girls are affected by negatively as they want to achieve that unrealistic appearance. In 2002, Emme, a full figured doll, was produced to help promote positive body images for girls that play with the doll (Dittmar, Halliwell, and Ive, 2006). As no study had been done in the past on the influence of thinness of girls, the contributors to this article created a study to see how Barbie dolls’ ultrathin appearance, Emme’s full figured appearance, and having no doll at all would effect girls ages five to eight years old (Dittmar et al., 2006). The researches used the Revised Body Esteem scale to test the participants’ “thoughts and feelings about their body, including general appearance, beliefs about how others evaluate their looks, and also specifically their weight” (Dittmar et al., 2006). 162 girls in Southern England participated in this study, mainly being white, middle class girls, with a third of the girls in each year group in each doll group: Barbie doll, Emme doll, and no doll (Dittmar et al., 2006). 5 ½ to 6 ½ year olds were in group A, 6 ½ to 7 ½ year olds were in group B, and 7 ½ to 8

Girls around the world are already unsatisfied with their bodies, and if you add toys that are un-proportional and make the girls feel even worse about their bodies what do you get? You get people with eating disorders trying to make themselves skinner and people spending thousands of dollars on plastic surgeries. These girls are trying to make themselves look like something unreachable, just because they think there is only one way to be beautiful. When girls are young they are given these toys that bring them down, so why do we give them to our children? We shouldn’t and we can stop how this is happening, we need to get rid of Barbie dolls so girls don’t endanger themselves and always feel bad about their bodies.

Barbie has had the influence on kids from a young age that in order to be beautiful, you had to have the perfect hair, clothes, and makeup. Children all over the world wanted to be like Barbie and look like her. This can lead to kids not being who they are and have bad low self- esteem issues. They didn’t look the ‘ideal look’ of Barbie. Many scientists believe that Barbie is to blame for young girls’ low self-esteem and negative body image.

A few days ago I was sitting at my desk waiting for one of my classes to start. I was casually scrolling through Facebook when an article caught my eye. I stopped and clicked the picture to read more. I read about the release of the newest line of Barbie. Barbie will forever be changed from the classic tall, thin, and blond girl she was to a unique doll with a variety of body shapes and sizes. When I read this article I was filled with mixed feelings. How could they change Barbie? To me the whole point of her is that she is the unobtainable plastic, stereotype of the “perfect” body. I have heard controversy in the past about whether or not she sets an unrealistic body standard for little girls. I did not believe that Barbie could have any effect on anyone’s views of what “beauty” is, until I considered the issue more closely. Then I began to form numerous of questions. Where do these ideals about beauty come from? How is beauty portrayed? What type of effects do these standards have on people? In 2016 members of American society are constantly overwhelmed with images of “beauty.” We see gorgeous size two models with perfect hair and perfect features, in magazines, on billboards, in television commercials and in our favorite television programs. How does media effect self-body image?