What's cold, plastic and smells like living in the past? It's Barbie, folks!
Of course, not everyone played with Mattel's greatest success story in their formative years. Some people's mums took them to free the whale rallies or allowed them to craft Germaine Greer in interpretive doll form from pipecleaners and cotton wool. Or, you know, was immune to the beseeching of their brattish daughters. But for everyone else there was Barbie, blonde-haired pneumatic waisted ultimately mute Barbie, as helpful as Katie Hopkins when attempting to transcend gender stereotypes, only slightly more sinister and with a slightly better PR team behind her.
It's not exactly a new idea to expand upon why Barbie's unrealistic body image is dangerous and unattainable. It's a tired debate and it's been done to death so often that for the first time in my life I feel sorry for someone taller, thinner, and prettier than myself, even if it is in 1:6 form. But what is comparatively recent is a designer's predilection to use Barbie as the muse and inspiration for his latest collection.
Milan fashion week previewed Italian design house Moschino's ready-to-wear collection for SS15 (mere minions like myself have no idea what to have for dinner tonight let alone what we're wearing next summer, but hey - fodder for another column). Headed up by designer Jeremy Scott, the collection saw models walking the runway in vertiginous blonde wigs (think Louis XIII doused with PVA glue running around Dollyworld) and luridly coloured skimpy outifts.
Key looks included a giant loomband belt, a two-piece with attached bikini and a wedgie-inducing gold hotpant-waistcoat combination, the likes of which would ordinarily be found only in a hole marked 'Kylie's rejects' next to Jason Donovan sweating and smelling slightly of terrorist conspiracy theories.
Scott has historically used popular culture to provide sensationalist references within his collections. This is a man who brought us the McDonald's French Fries iphone case in previous years (the sweet irony being, of course, that the fashionistas who creamed their pants to get one have never known the sweet, sweet taste of ingesting the real McCoy. Although McCoy as an idiom is null and void knowing that fast food chips are often made from flour.) But why Barbie?
Of the collection, Scott has said: "Every little girl and lots of little boys have grown up loving her. So she's the cue for the collection this season. There are no other references because she encompasses everything. Like every girl and gay boy, I loved Barbie. It's hard not to; she's practically perfect. She had every job. She's even been an astronaut!"
Ah. So many absolutely golden soundbites, so few column inches to write individual cutting think pieces on them all. But before this writer remembers there's washing to be done or Scott's misogyny trophy to polish or all the other things she should be doing when she's *even* being a dedicated follower of calling people out on their WTF-ery, one problem becomes clear.
Little girls and boys grow up loving lots of things. Eating chalk. Peeing in the paddling pool. Sticking pennies into plug sockets. Doesn't mean it'll make them feel good, doesn't mean they they should be encouraged, and most importantly it doesn't mean that just because something is granted a place in nostalgia's hall of fame that it should be resurrected as a credible idea to perpetuate in adulthood.
Put simply, Barbie isn't a cultural relevant icon any more. Not because she's thin and because she has long blonde hair - many women (and men) have these traits and are still significant in helping to transcend stereotypes. Both Mattel and Scott's Barbies aren't strong women - and if we're going to give kids a doll to cherish and hold in high esteem, shouldn't strength in every sense of the word be an important attribute to attain to?
You don't get the impression Barbie could respond to a wolf whistle with a withering comment in the street if it happened because she's too busy coming out with puerile gems like "Will we ever have enough clothes?" and "I love shopping!". (Barbie's most famous phrase "Math class is tough!" was dropped after criticism from the American Association of University Women. Know what else is tough? Having to purge your wardrobe every time you move house. Enough of the clothes obsession, B.)
By way of a comparison, here's a list of five things Barbie couldn't or wouldn't do. And as much as I don't like to point them out (Emma Watson totally nicked my ethos of not defining women by what they can't do but by what they can do in her speech earlier this week), I'd argue if we're going to give our daughters a doll to play with, at least make it one who knows the value of appropriate office wear.
1 Complete an hour with the fantastically militant fitness coach at Dennistoun's Whitehill gym. Yes there's been aerobic instructor Barbie, but unless she's spewed at a spin class she just won't cut the mustard.
2 Get the bus and pay the fare in five pence denominations. Driving a pink Corvette convertible (or getting Ken to pick her up) isn't exactly being mindful of your eco credentials.
3 Wear Clarks. Because it's fine to want to avoid bunions in later life and not cry every time you need to do anything other than sit down.
4 Choose her partners based on more than appearance (Barbie and Ken 'split' in 2004 and then reunited after Ken got a makeover. Nice.)
5 Get her hair cut. Pixie crop, Mia from Pulp Fiction, Natalie Portman circa V is for Vendetta - anything would do. Or a shaved head. Though, Sinead, Nothing Compares 2 U.
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