I Hate Barbie

“Irrepressible thoughts of death”

My hometown of Amherst, MA was so liberal that no one ever made fun of me for having a lesbian mother.

From birth I was taught to hate Barbie. She was predatory and damaging to young girls. She was anorexia personified.

While I still call myself a progressive, I’ve eschewed some of the more radical Amherst dogma for centrist positions.

But they were right about Barbie.

Barbie evokes suffering in girls, scorn in teens and finally gets reshaped | Archive

In a study published in the journal Developmental Psychology, girls aged 5 to 8 were exposed either to traditional Barbies, to the Emme doll (size 16) or to no dolls (control). Results indicated that these little girls exposed to Barbie had lower self esteem and poorer body image than those in the comparison groups. These results are troubling because poorer body image is related to a host of issues such as disordered eating and weight cycling.

And from Britannica:

[…] in 1994 researchers in Finland announced that if Barbie were a real woman, she would not have enough body fat to menstruate.

Barbie is peddled as an inspiration to girls with the tagline, “You can be anything,” and her 150 occupations are supposedly evidence of this.

Bullshit. Barbie is a 19-year-old fashion model who, like a porn actress, dresses up as a sexy doctor or politician sometimes. She has 150 costumes, but only one job.

I suspect girls are drawn to Barbie for the same reasons they obsess over Instagram—it feels bad in a way that is addictive.

Making women hate their bodies is profitable, and those who are best at it (like Kylie Jenner) have knack for branding themselves as uplifters of women.

They’re not.

You may be rolling your eyes at my sensitivity. “Liberals and their liberal shrinks think dolls can hurt little girls,” you say, chuckling with a self-assuredness no toy could ever impugn.

But the Barbie movie agrees with me—a spicy Latina teenager shouts as much right in Barbie’s face: “You've been making women feel bad about themselves since you were invented. You set the feminist movement back 50 years.”

She even calls Barbie a fascist.

Barbie, crying, responds: “She thinks I'm a fascist? I don't control the railways or the flow of commerce!”

A funny line, but wait—maybe the movie doesn’t agree with me, because now we’re mocking the teenage girl for calling Barbie out. What does Gerwig really think about this?

We never find out. A sickening fog of equivocation descends over the proceedings, allowing you to extract whatever convoluted message you want: Yeah, some feminists are really mad at Barbie, and they have every right to be angry, but maybe they overdo it a little—not that it’s a bad thing for women to be emotional—and hey, we at Mattel can laugh at ourselves, not that we’re dismissing your concerns, because they are valid concerns…

In another scene, Barbie meets an old woman on a bench.

She tells the old woman, “You’re beautiful.” (A nice sentiment but this would probably not be Barbie’s reaction to seeing her first 85-year-old.)

The woman replies, “I know it!”

The scene would have fit nicely into the existential crisis theme, but as it stands it feels like a pointless aside.

Greta Gerwig On Why She Rejected Idea Of Cutting ‘Barbie’ Scene With Margot Robbie & Older Woman On The Bench

“I love that scene so much,” Gerwig told Rolling Stone. “And the older woman on the bench is the costume designer Ann Roth. She’s a legend. It’s a cul-de-sac of a moment, in a way — it doesn’t lead anywhere. And in early cuts, looking at the movie, it was suggested, ‘Well, you could cut it. And actually, the story would move on just the same.’ And I said, ‘If I cut the scene, I don’t know what this movie is about.'”

Ms. Gerwig, if the only scene that still touches your heart is an thematically-orphaned cul-de-sac, the movie is already not about what you want it to be about. The honest thing to do would be to cut the scene.

But the remnants of Gerwig’s vision do interest me. I think they’re still in the movie somewhere, lurking like a shipwreck under 13,000 feet of pink jello.

Barbie’s story begins when she finds she is having “irrepressible thoughts of death” which alienate her from the carefree inhabitants of Barbieland. Additionally, her pointed feet go flat and she develops a patch of cellulite, which we see very briefly (she reacts with horror, which is strange because one of the other Barbies is fat).

Our Barbie (dubbed Stereotypical Barbie) goes to see Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon), a kind of witch doctor who tells Barbie that in order to fix things (her cellulite) she must go to the real world and figure out why her human counterpart/owner is sad, and stop her from telepathically projecting that sadness to Barbie.

Spoofing the Matrix, McKinnon gives Barbie a choice between a high heel and an old sandal: stay here or see the real world. Barbie chooses the high heel, preferring ignorance. Weird Barbie says she doesn’t actually have a choice and ushers her out to the real world.

This is the end of Act I, and the movie is already structurally ruined. Here is why:

At the beginning of our story, Barbie is perfect and her life is perfect—which makes it meaningless. Barbie wonders if there is something more out there, something more important than perfection.

But then, while still in Barbieland, her feet go flat and she gets cellulite.

This makes no sense. The cellulite should be the price of meaning, an obstacle she encounters along the way, and something she must accept as part of being human.

Instead, Kate McKinnon tells her that going to the real world will fix her cellulite.

How? And if Barbie is having irrepressible thoughts of death, how would seeing the real world fix that?

This is more equivocation from the filmmakers. They can’t just say Barbie is hollow and boring and it’s better to be a real woman who loves and shits and dies, but they also can’t say cellulite is bad and women should be perfect, so they hide behind a story that makes no sense.

To top it off, they have Barbie choose to stay in Barbieland, maybe because it would hurt the brand if she actually wanted to leave Barbieland of her own accord.

Ironically (given America Ferrara’s third-act monologue about expectations of women), our main character is not allowed to have flaws, yet is also not allowed to be perfect, and her only driving motivation is something the movie has decided it would be too weird to talk about—existential dread.

In a later scene, Barbie meets Rhea Pearlman (playing the creator of Barbie), who waxes poetic Barbie’s inspirational legacy.

Imagine instead if they’d had the conversation Gerwig really wanted—if Barbie had touched Perlman’s wrinkly face and asked, “Is it worth it?”

What a life- and woman-affirming movie we could have had if Perlman had replied, “Every wrinkle.”

At the end of the movie, Barbie does decide to “become human,” but there is no visual representation of this happening and it feels like a tacked-on ending.

The Patriarchy

Back in Amherst, I was also taught that women can’t be sexist, people of color can’t be racist, and white men are the origin of all bigotry.

That never made sense to me. I saw and experienced plenty of bigotry from women and people of color.

The prevailing explanation, then and now, is that because of the broader statistical power imbalances in society, it is impossible for white men to experience oppression in any situation.

While I will passionately acknowledge the unfair dominance of white men, I won’t ignore the fact that humans constantly interact in multiple overlapping power structures of all shapes and sizes.

Yes, your female boss can sexually harass you, even if the male CEO harasses her, too. Your black teacher can be racist to you, even if the white principal is racist to him. The oppression of women and minorities doesn’t excuse their own bigotry.

The Barbie movie relies heavily on this moral fallacy to explain its awful treatment of men.

In Barbieland, men are second-class citizens. They have no power and exist solely to pathetically vie for Barbie’s attention. Worse than being eye-candy, since no one likes looking at them, they are abandoned puppies.

From the song, “I’m Just Ken”:

'Cause I'm just Ken
Anywhere else I'd be a ten
Is it my destiny to live and die a life of blonde fragility?
I'm just Ken
Where I see love, she sees a friend
What will it take for her to see the man behind the tan and fight for me?

Ken’s torment is played for laughs, which is odd since he’s the only relatable character.

When Ken accompanies Barbie to the real world, he supposedly discovers patriarchy—mostly he is just excited to learn that men are allowed to be doctors, bankers, and lifeguards.

But when he tries to get these jobs, he is told that being a man isn’t qualification enough. So actually he learns that he is a loser with no job or purpose.

Despite seeing no evidence of a male-dominated society in Los Angeles, Ken returns to Barbieland and indeed establishes a patriarchy where the Barbies are brainwashed out of their important jobs and into subservience (they bring the Kens beer when asked).

Barbie and her human friends (America Ferrara and her teenage daughter, played by Ariana Greenblatt) are horrified by the role reversal, and this inspires an angry feminist speech from Ferrara that would be uplifting in another context, but falls flat here.

It is literally impossible to be a woman. You are so beautiful, and so smart, and it kills me that you don’t think you’re good enough. Like, we have to always be extraordinary, but somehow we’re always doing it wrong.

You have to be thin, but not too thin. And you can never say you want to be thin. You have to say you want to be healthy, but also you have to be thin. You have to have money, but you can’t ask for money because that’s crass. You have to be a boss, but you can’t be mean. […]

I’m just so tired of watching myself and every single other woman tie herself into knots so that people will like us. And if all of that is also true for a doll just representing women, then I don’t even know.

(Yes, I am aware of the many similarities between this and my most recent post.)

The speech appeals to our knowledge of the broad oppression of women, but it has nothing to do with the movie. Not only is Barbie unaware of sexism against women, she has lived her entire life in a matriarchy controlled by her.

Yet, she nods wistfully at Ferrara’s speech as if it deeply resonates with her.

It makes no sense. Patriarchy is not the shape of Barbie’s hell.

Barbie is in rich white girl hell. She is tormented by perfection, purity, sterility, safety, vapidity, and incomprehensible loneliness.

Again, I mourn Gerwig’s first screenplay draft, which I imagine asked the forbidden question: “What the fuck is the point of being Barbie?”

Rich white girl hell doesn't inspire uprisings, it makes people kill themselves.

Imagine the confusion and tumult in Barbieland if Barbie showed up to the beach with cuts all over her thighs. Picture the chaos if she shaved her head like Britney Spears.

Dream with me of a Barbie movie that addresses drug use, sex, eating disorders, and family relationships—you know, the issues the target audience is wrestling with.

Of course this is impossible, because Gerwig’s crosshairs would necessarily fix upon Barbie herself. So she blames men instead.

Barbie and her friends decide to dismantle Ken’s patriarchy. How do they do it?

Manipulation.

They pretend to be interested in The Godfather, they feign ineptitude at sports, they flirt with multiple men to create jealousy.

While the Kens are distracted, the brainwashed Barbies are taken into a van and deprogrammed by America Ferrara, who teaches them feminist platitudes like: “You have to be their mommy but not remind them of their mommy.”

In the final confrontation, Ken breaks down and expresses his pain about his unrequited love for Barbie.

She tells him she doesn't love him and he needs to go figure out who he is on his own.

Suddenly inspired, Ken agrees and sets off to discover himself. But this is a different ending than Barbie deciding to “become human?” Ken is going to self-actualize without becoming human, I guess. It’s a mess.

Matriarchy restored, the other Kens ask if they can at least have one justice on the Barbie supreme court. The Barbies laugh and say no.

Sex

Ken: I thought I might stay over tonight.

Barbie: Why?

Ken: ‘Cause we’re girlfriend-boyfriend.

Barbie: To do what?

Ken: I’m actually not sure.

(This scene is in the trailer.)

Sexuality can be tastefully woven into kids’ movies via clever subtext, but this movie is pg-13, Ken’s sexual frustration is made explicit, and Barbie at one point literally says “he doesn’t have a penis.”

If sex is a forbidden topic, why not make Ken her actual boyfriend who is tired of being a sidekick? Instead they go for the body horror of being a horny doll with no dick.

Watch this lame clip:

This is homophobic. Usually I employ a three-strike system but a woke movie like Barbie shouldn’t be homophobic at all, so they only get one strike.

There are no gay characters in this movie, not even Weird Barbie, and that makes this type of humor particularly alienating to gay people.

My analysis of the baffling presentation of Ken’s sexuality is this: Ken was originally supposed to be gay.

This would explain his dogged pursuit of Barbie despite their lack of chemistry, his immediate love of Los Angeles, and his homoerotic competition with a rival Ken played by Simu Liu (a role which feels incomplete and, if my theory is correct, had a bunch of gay shit edited out).

Nope, Ken isn’t gay. He just likes pink, rollerblading, muscles, hanging out with dudes, fashion, and is insatiably horny. Maybe Gerwig told herself that the gay audience members will fill in the blanks ourselves when he goes to “find himself.”

No, fuck you.

What about Barbie?

She appears to be asexual.

I don't think she even eats anything throughout the entire film. There's a running gag where Barbie's shower doesn't actually produce water, her cups are empty, etc. During her day in the real world, she eventually learns to delicately sip real water.

Shouldn't she have eaten a gigantic Cali burrito stuffed with French fries? Don't we want to see Barbie experience burping, farting, sweating, kissing, anger, love, fear—or is all that stuff supposed to happen after the movie ends?

What if Barbie wanting to become human was the first plot point instead of the conclusion, like in a normal movie such as The Little Mermaid or Pinocchio?

Not only is Barbie sexless, she is proud of it.

Some construction workers catcall her in Los Angeles, and she is confused at first. She then explains, defiantly and proudly, “I don't have a vagina.”

The men are taken aback. Wow, she really showed them.

That's when she points to Ken and says, “He doesn't have a penis. We don't have genitals.”

Ken, humiliated, mumbles “I have all the genitals” as they walk away.

Wait, how is Barbie owning the men by not having a vagina, and also owning them by Ken not having a penis?

I guess only stupid boys like sex and genitals.

It is also noteworthy that, as Ken walks through Los Angeles in skimpy clothing, no one hits on him. So at no point does Ken ever get exposed to the idea that anyone could be attracted to him.

There is one moment of female sexuality:

During a car chase, the teenage girl asks her mother, “Where did you learn to drive like this?”

Ferrara begins wistfully, “There was this guy…”

The girl interrupts: “It was dad?”

“Yeah. It was dad.”

She and Barbie then exchange a knowing look.

What? This girl is 14, not 4. Does she really think that when her mom says “there was this guy” she is referring to her dad? Or is it that one's mother having a sexual relationship with anyone other than one's father is so horrifying that even a brash feminist 14-year-old in Los Angeles must block it out of her mind?

Okay but is it good?

Have you seen Suicide Squad (2016)?

This movie does a slightly better job of disguising the lack of plot momentum with needle drops and set pieces, but no, it isn't good.

It was funny when Ken took over Barbie's dream house and said: “This shall henceforth be known as Ken's mojo dojo casa house.”

Shaelin and I both laughed out loud, and then the characters promptly ran the joke into the ground by repeating it three more times in the next thirty seconds.

Will Ferrell is not funny. Michael Cera isn't funny. Kate McKinnon is kind of funny because she is great at building humorous tension, so it seems like she's always about to say something funny, which is better than nothing I guess.

It's not their fault. To be funny, jokes have to reveal something that we're all thinking but nervous to talk about. The Barbie movie is not interested in revealing anything about women, men, children, Barbie, or Mattel, so it can't be funny.

If you want to watch Barbie be funny, watch Toy Story 3.

It does feel like Robbie and Gosling come out unscathed, but that is part of the insidious manipulation of Barbie’s marketing campaign and fourth-wall-breaking aesthetic.

We’re not really making a Barbie movie. That would be lame. This is a subversion of a Barbie movie made by subversive filmmakers. Ryan Gosling isn’t really playing Ken. He’s pretending to play Ken because it’s funny. Mattel wants to sell toys because they’re a big boring corporation, Gerwig and Baumbach want to tell a story, and Robbie and Gosling are caught in the middle of this wacky clash of ideas and motivations! Isn’t that funny?

Even during the movie, the characters actively comment on this game of pass-the-buck, like when Robbie says she doesn’t feel pretty anymore, and Helen Mirren’s voiceover says, “Margot Robbie is probably the wrong person to cast to make this point.”

We had to cast a pretty woman because Mattel and Warner Bros made us.

There’s a fat Barbie? A trans Barbie?

Yeah. Ken might not have a penis, but somebody does…

Barbie!

Barbie can be anything, and anything can be Barbie. Men can be women, fat people can be thin, and nothing means anything.

Barbie actually does get a vagina at the end of the movie. After she becomes human, she goes to a clinic and delivers the final line: “I’m here to see my gynecologist.”

Smash to credits before anything gross or weird happens when BARBIE goes to the gynecologist.

Who’d want to see that?