Scheme to give Barbie dolls to primary school children

I recall my sons having chopper bikes in dark colours and their girl cousins having pink bikes with a basket for their "shopping." My sons wanted guns, Jedi swords and to play football/cricket/rugby and their girl cousins wanted baby dolls and dancing lessons.

Girls definitely wore pink, not all the time but pink was popular for girls.

Well, I also grew up in the 1970s and

• wasn’t allowed to wear trousers or shorts only dresses and skirts.
• wasnt allowed a boy haircut
• I had the bad old blonde Barbies plus one dark haired Barbie that my blonde Barbie would bully.
• wasn’t allowed boy toys like lego
• couldn’t join the Boy Scouts, so made do with girl guides which Red Cross certified me in infant care, infant and child CPR and babysitting along with teaching me skills like more sewing and crafting. None of the fun stuff the boys got to do.
• wasnt allowed to take wood/metal shop classes with the boys- was forced to take home economics which was sewing and cooking class
• wasnt allowed to do football, rugby or netball as those were boy sports
• was told university wasn’t for me, but rather marriage, babies and maybe if I’m lucky a job at the village co-op because girls don’t need to earn a living but boys do,

How do you recall it, then?

I was a mother in the 70s and it isn't how I remember it either except girls with short hair wasn't unusual.

What was your experience?

What? That’s not the 1970s childhood I remember at all.

Try following my link. Barbie comes in petite, curvy and plus size and none of them have giant fake titties any more.

But being feminineine does not necessarily equate with pink plastic toys and Barbie dolls.to my mind that is just a consumer version of femininity.

Being 'feminine'can mean liking to nurture your teddy bear or tuck it up into bed; or liking pair bonding types of play.

By the way, I personally wear skirts most of the time because that is what suits my body shape. If i had a slimmer more androgynous figure I'd wear very different clothes to the ones I do. That is because I am very conscious of aesthetics; love beaitiful objects, design, and like my home to be comfortable and so on. I appreciate beauty. I also contribute to an almost exclusively male soecialist interest forum which focuses on urbanism and architecture.
I reckon they see many see as having a 'feminine' sensibility.

Critiquing Disney, Barbie and american consumer culture is not to suggest I am a better feminist than you. I don't even call myself a feminist anymore, actually. I'm just interested in women's isues - naturally.

I am with you on the imaginative play issue. When I was working in schools a few years ago, part of what I did involved having children create a story or narrative, and we used play to get things moving. Many had a lot of trouble when they were much older than you'd expect.

Playmobile is funny. Part of why adults feel it is healthier is that it is more abstract looking, but for kids, I think they don't read quite as "real" people, and not quite adults either.

I wouldn't have wanted Steiner as some sort of role model for my kids and as they are mixed race he wouldn't have wanted it either so I suppose I can agree with him on one thing.

I'm sorry, but I don't agree.

The one main difference, for example, between my education and that of boys at similar type of school was that we were expected to do Domestic Science, and they did Woodwork.

There will always be differences between boys and girls - because there are sexed differences - but the way that gender has become packaged up now has resulted in many girs wanted to simply opt out of what 'being a girl' is now supposed to represent.

My granddaughter ( who is now 8) decided she wanted her cut short when she was 5 ( in spite of no other girls at her school having short hair). She's quite athletic and sporty and likes gaming/tech amongst other more 'girly' preferences. The stylist my daughter had booked completely freaked out. She'd never cut a girl's hair short before - so another older, more experienced stylist had to take over. This is quite common now, I notice: some women's stylists just don't/can't work with short hair. There is a uniform, standard look amongst many girls now -which involves long, straight hair, fake tan, nails etc

I used to teach in secondary schools - and I simply don't think it is true that the gulf between girls and boys was any wider when I was at secondary school - than it is now. It maybe because I went to an school geared up to academic accomplishment? Personally I think single sex schools are good for girls - they can just focus on what they enjoy and are good at without the distraction of boys/pubertal surges etc

I don't think that much has changed between men and women, actually- the hard wired differences ( and same issues) remain - even though more women are now in a range of occupations they simply wouldn't have been in the 1970s.

Yeah, they should hand out free friendship pine cones instead!

The diversity in skin colour is good and the availability of dolls with disabilities is good, but they are all still promoting unrealistic body shapes. The standard Barbie is so bad that people are apparently fooled into thinking the newer dolls represent real diversity in body shape. Even “Curvy” Barbie would scale up to a size 8 adult woman - she would be taller and skinnier than the average young woman and with a highly unrealisticly small waist.

With more than 1 in 7 healthy weight girls dieting, a big increase in healthy weight boys dieting, a lowering of the age at which children first start dieting, an increase in the number of healthy weight girls who consider themselves overweight, and an increase in depression for girls who consider themselves overweight, schools need to be very careful about whether they are a part of the normalization of unrealistic body shape ideals and the promotion of a culture that leaves girls feeling bad about being unable to meet them.

My mother literally used to ask the hairdresser to cut my hair into a “paige boy” style. I hated it.

I’m sure there were plenty of girls that liked climbing trees, having short hair and dressing in brown. I didn’t. And lots of other girls didn’t.

This is the whole point of Barbie - a lot of the misogyny that feminine women encounter is actually from other women that sneer at beauty aesthetics and ‘bimbo’ insults. You’re not a superior type of female because you have short hair, play sport and don’t like make up. Other types of women exist - ones that are ok with dresses and lipstick and still have brains, qualifications, families and professional jobs.

If you look at fashions of the last few centuries let alone decades and the roles, opportunities and place in society between men and women you'll see how ludicrous it is to blame barbie for apparently exasperating it.

I don't like the advertising aspect. But I will stick up for Barbie. DD was obsessed when young. Didn't like any other stereotypically 'girl' things but loved Barbie. Barbie is intelligent, effective, a good friend and family member, has lots of jobs which help her and others, assertive and independent. Passes the Bechdel test in every episode of the series. The series is funny too, "how many jobs HAVE you had Barbie?" "how old ARE you Barbie?". Her relationship with Ken is very much an addition to her life, NOT the main focus.

OK so the body image stuff is awful. It's not a matriarchal utopia like My Little Pony. But it's not as terrible as it used to be. We also got all hers from a mum of twin boys, one of whom LOVED Barbie and Elsa,

DD has grown into a short-haired, jeans and hoodie wearing feminist. Despite Barbie's evil machinations. Not sure we will see the film but I think DD might enjoy a little stroll down memory lane.

The wider issue is that children in general don't do those things anymore. Playing outside is definitely not as much of a thing but we did it in the 80s and 90s and played with barbies (shock horror). Decades gone by absolutely had a wider gulf between girls and boys than we have now, it's ridiculous to suggest otherwise.

I grew up during the 1970's; played netball, rounders, rode my bike, climbed trees, made dens, constructed cities out of lego; had short hair; enjoyed school; did well; went to an all girls grammar school - continued with sport; and being aspirational was encouraged.

Things changed in the early 1980's - and that was down to the arrival of American style consumer culture and the corportate culture. It was very marked.

It wasn't " boyish". It was just girls with short hair styles.

Can't you see how defining things in such gendered ways has led to where we are now?

So many women who personally detest the vomitous nature of the colour pallet are denying their daughters a softer more playful expression of what it is to be a female child.

Because anything masculine or associated with men will also be seen as superior and aspirational.

Is this true though? People go on about the past as if it was some sort of androgynous beacon of equality when it was anything but. Clothing was heavily sexed, women and girls didn't have the same opportunities as boys and men even at school let alone at work, boys were ridiculed for playing with dolls etc and there were very clear societal expectations.

And yet lots of little girls took to it and love it - pink, sparkles and all things cute. The kawaii trend is the same. What is wrong with that? I fucking hated the brown 1970s aesthetic with the boyish haircut and boyish school shoes. I would’ve given anything for the disneyesque colours and frills that girls have now. So many women who personally detest the vomitous nature of the colour pallet are denying their daughters a softer more playful expression of what it is to be a female child.

Imaginative play & small world play is great for kids - they should get more chances to do it, inside and outside school.

If they have lego & playmobil, that is great. but if they only have access to Barbie (because budget / promotion whatever), that is OK too. much better than nothing.

Before the Barbie craziness this pink -princess obsession just wasn't a thing, though. American consumer culture packaged up gender and sold it to people in the form of expensive plastic toys and hyper stereotyped role models.
Mattel and Disney.

In the 1970's girls didn't wear pink, toy aisles were not segregated in the way they are now - there was far more uni-sex styles of clothing and girls often had short hair..

It's the sort of feminism that is rooted and created by consumerism and the 'lifestyles' that can purchased, in my view.

The early women's movemnt rejected all of that.