Good Deeds of Barbie Barbie dolls, the most popular doll in the world (Gerber, 2010), where invented in 1950’s when a lady called Ruth Handler watched her daughter playing with paper dolls and giving them adult roles (Briana, 2009). According to Papantoniou (2012) Barbie dolls are being sold in over than 150 countries worldwide with only one motto which is “we girls can do anything” (Delgado, 2014). Since the beginning the objective of Barbie dolls was to make young girls imagine their adulthood. Barbie dolls have over 100 careers that make them a perfect roll model for young girls in order motivating them and teaching them how to be hardworking ladies in future. Some might say that the unrealistic shape of Barbie will hurt young girls’ perception, but as one of the designers of Barbie company say “girls’ perceptions are so different than grown ups’ perceptions about what real is and what real isn’t…..
Youthful Beauty In the world of spray-tanned nine year olds known as 'Child Beauty Pageants', spending thousands in an effort to win a simple tiara is a common--almost mandatory--act. Although, the tiara is not all that is won in these pageants; a sense of pride and supremacy is also at stake. What is risked when these pageant parents put all their emphasis on the outer beauty of their impressionable daughters? At such a young age, a child's future mentality depends on the morals and priorities they are brought up to have. To prevent the potential superficial women that may come from these pageants, there should be an age limit present in child beauty pageants.
How popular she is and perfect she is, and so naturally these girls are beginning to want to be just like Barbie, happy and perfect all of the time. There is always so much to look, act and dress. And young girls worldwide feel the need to fit in and the only way to do that is to look and act a certain way. Barbie has always been there to set the trends. Feminist say that Barbie is the cause of worldwide eating disorders, low self-esteem and false perception of beauty.
Artificially Perfect When invented in the late 1950s by Mattel, the Barbie doll was considered the model woman. For many generations little girls have played with this doll and some even thought that’s how they were supposed to look and act. The Barbie doll was everthing. She was the perfect housewive, she had a career for herself, and she was even the party girl all while mainting her perfect hair, makeup, and tiny wasitline. Within the past few years the idea of the Barbie doll has been questioned by society: is Barbie what every woman is to suppose to look and act like?
History of Barbie in Advertising Barbie Millicent Roberts, better known to the world as the famous Barbie, debuted March 3, 1959. While Barbie was originally designed for Ruth Handler's daughter Barbara, the appeal soon grew to children across America. Ruth realized that as children grew tired of playing with baby dolls, they did not have a replacement to play with. With this in mind, Ruth set out to create a doll that would allow children the ability to see what they would grow up to look like. Ruth modeled Barbie after a German fashion doll called Bild Lilli.
First debuting in 1959, Barbie has mislead girls since their youth of what society perceives the perfect woman to look like. The average girl from ages 3-11 owns at least ten Barbie dolls and each hour spent playing with them, the more influence it has on them (Bennett, Saren). Yet, this is not a positive influence. Barbie is not the perfect role model for all girls. It is bad that Barbie, a 6 foot tall, 100 pound, size 0, infertile doll is possibly believed to be realistic and perfect (Bennett, Saren).
For most parents and their little girls it is just good fun. They do not take the beauty pageants seriously. For a few parents the beauty pageants become an obsession. This is when beauty pageants for children can suddenly become very harmful. “Critics of the industry warn that the stresses of competition, coupled with an extreme focus on physical appearance, can have a negative effect long before these girls will be eligible for Miss America.” (Triggs, West and Aradillas 160-168) The loss of self-esteem, the inability to show a full range of emotions, the fear of failure, the extreme focus on physical image, and the discord with or fear of parents are a few of the symptoms those little girls will suffer from.
The children that compete in these beauty contests aged generally between 2 to 10 years old (sometimes even younger) usually have one only goal: get the money and get the tiara. Of course, these little beauties do not enter the contests at their own request, but their mothers are the ones to fill in the applications on time, pay the participation fee, create or buy the outfit, establish the type of performance for the talent section (usually some song about the greatest love in one’s life and/or a terrible heartbreak,) create and exercise the hairstyle and make-up, keep a strict rehearsal schedule, hire trainers if the mum herself cannot coach the whole thing, fill in the gas tank and travel hundreds of miles with their children just to spend a weekend on an emotional roller coaster that for most of the mother-daughter teams ends in heartbreak and
Brittany Butler Sara Jankowski ENG 112-MO March 1, 2010 Perfectionism and Society In 1973, Marge Piercy published a poem by the name of “Barbie Doll’ in her collection of poems, Circle on the Water. This poem was inspired by the popular doll, Barbie, produced in 1959 by Mattel. Soon after the doll came out, Barbie became an idol to young girls everywhere, with her perfect looks, dream house, and even her car and boyfriend. The ‘perfect’ image of what a young girl should be soon became the “Barbie” image, blonde hair, blue eyes, and a slim athletic figure. Young girls tried with all of their might to be just like Barbie, to be perfect.
Most people who are familiar with Cinderella have little understanding of the subliminal messages associated and the consequences involved. To many, Cinderella is a harmless story of a young girl who struggles through life, is finally able to achieve her dreams, and lives happily ever after. In reality, the patriarchal gender expectations and rewards associated with Disney’s Cinderella can be damaging to young girls and their self-image. Therefore, in order to render the misogynistic ideologies of these stories invalid, modern pedagogy should be recreated to incorporate potential empowerment for both genders. Most people believe fairy tales to be harmless to a girl’s development, unable to comprehend the reality of the situation: the gender stereotyping involved in these stories can be influential in several ways (Bonds-Raake 232).