Barbie Fest

Barbie is hipper than ever, still sporting a rocking body that no real woman outside of Heidi Montag could ever dream of, and is now adorned in the latest Christian Louboutin outfit. Christian Louboutin, in case you are not aware of him, is a French designer who is most notable for his striking shoe designs with red-soles, made famous numerous models walking up and down the catwalk.

I’m what you’d call the opposite of a Barbie fan. As a kid, I wrote stories about G.I. Joes brutally blowing Barbies up. I cut off their hair, drew on them, threw them into trees and pretty much destroyed them in every way I could think of.

After thoroughly making it clear to everyone on Earth that just about any present was fair game for our child so long as it wasn’t a Barbie, my in-laws came with just that for our daughter’s fourth birthday.
Big surprise.
To give them the benefit of the doubt—which is probably a mistake, as I’m sure they did this just to spite me, as they do with plenty of other things—it wasn’t a Barbie Barbie. It was a little girl Barbie (one of Barbie’s so-called friends, I suppose) with a horse covered in enough glitter to make our house look like a confetti factory.

Don’t you just hate it when people give your kid stuff you don’t want your kid to have? Well-meaning friends and relatives may offer your daughter some soda, candy, or other treat, not realizing they’d already had a fudge pop that day, which is your rule—and of course, when your rule is broken by another adult, it simply declines in value and becomes much easier to break.

Barbie’s played a mom, a doctor, a ballerina, a surfer, a pop star, and a slew of other roles, which is great for girls to see. After all, who better to teach them that they can do anything they set their hearts on than the plastic princess they play with every day?

Barbie gets a pretty bad rap these days, and why shouldn’t she? If she were a real, live human she’d be 5’9” with measurements at 36-18-33. (The average American woman’s measurements are 40-34-43.) This means that Barbie wouldn’t even have enough fat to have a menstrual cycle. Only 1 in 100,000 people have the probability of getting a body like Barb’s, whereas likely 1 in every 1 girl who has one wants a body like hers!

Have you seen the Failed Toys reports on YouTube? They come from Mike Mozart of Jeepers Media. Mike is a toy designer himself. He’s got some pretty hilarious reports, from Marvel heroes with questionable body parts to toddler toys that can confuse kids—and their parents.

Barbie
Photo Source: Migraine Chick via Flickr

Life goes on as usual for the Barbie franchise. People are still donning party hats and toasting to her 50th birthday. The latest celebratory move was nabbing Bollywood star Katrina Kaif. Apparently the Indian versions of the Barbie will be modeled after her face.

Contrary to what most of us would have expected, March wasn't all about the financial sector. Rather, there was also a concerted effort to highlight the evils of one famous little doll. That's right. I am referring to Delegate Jeff Eldridge's, by now famous, effort to ban Barbie from West Virginia.