Barbie was one of my favorite toys growing up. Hands down. I loved building houses for her, creating walls on my dresser out of my double-fold Grease and Muppet Movie albums, making furniture out of old tissue boxes, dressing her up, playing out scenarios of glamourous parties and a fabulous life. As a child, I didn’t have the multitudes of Barbie dolls my daughters seemed to acquire. As you can probably discern based on the fact that I had to build a house out of record albums, we could not afford to buy the Barbie Mansion and indeed, I think I may have actually only owned two dolls in my entire childhood. I never actually owned a Ken doll. Regardless, she was much loved.
I own a ridiculous number of the animated Barbie movies that were released in the middle 2000’s and my daughters and I enjoyed them immensely. When the owners of a company I worked for re-did the office space and decided to give everyone a bold and funky accent wall in their office, the original color selected for my space was a lime green. After seeing that a bold fuchsia was also in the “approved” palate, I requested that my space be painted that bold color which could only be described as “Barbie Pink.” It was GLORIOUS.
“Pink is my signature color.”
Shelby Eatenton Latcherie, Steel Magnolias
One of my favorite Barbie takes remains the ending of Toy Story 2. As the credits rolled and the outtakes played, she said farewell to everyone in the theatre. “Are they call gone? I can’t keep smiling anymore; I am exhausted!” Girl, I feel that in my soul some days.
Barbie is the OG resistor. Career driven, she did not need a man to achieve her goals. She drove the jeep; Ken sat in the passenger seat. At 63, she still lives a fabulous, unapologetic life. Anyone worrying that she gives girls some skewed perception of feminine beauty should have their head examined. Vogue, Seventeen, Cosmo, and most recently, social media and it’s vapid influencers can clearly take the lion’s share of the blame for this. Not a doll. People worrying about this need to get a damn grip. Barbie’s slogan is “you can be anything” and that is some simple positivity that we could all use in our lives.
So when it was announced that there would be a live action movie starring Margot Robbie, I was tickled pink, pun intended. I very much enjoy Margot Robbie; one my my favorite performances of hers to date is her take on Tonya Harding. Ryan Gosling… well, I am non-committal; though many of my friends have adored him since his performance in The Notebook, he’s not really my cup of tea. I have a type, dear readers, and it’s not Ryan Gosling. My taste usually runs more to what can only be termed “knuckle-dragger.” I like what I like. But Ryan, with all his earnest pretty good looks, is spot on casting.
While this film was likely not going to be the next “Schindler’s List,” it was clear that this was going to be FUN. I will gladly part with $20 this summer to see this frothy bit of cinematic cotton candy. I like cotton candy; I used to make cotton candy 30 years ago at a local amusement park. That’s a story for another day.
So imagine my surprise when the collective RWNJ set decided that Barbie is a whole bunch of “woke” propaganda. I’m sorry, what the actual FUCK? For those of you not in the know, RWNJ is the new Myers Briggs personality type. The typical RWNJ is afraid of gay people, teachers, black people, trans people, a woman’s right to choose, brown people, science, vaccines, atheists, books, feminists, socialized medicine, wind mills, female orgasms, beer, librarians, electric cars, and a number of countless other things. Above all, they are afraid of “woke.” Though none of them could likely actually define what “woke” even is. It’s essentially anything they disagree with. Apparently we can now add Barbie to that list.
Several RWNJ personalities who likely cannot find a clitoris even with a map and a GPS have come out over the weekend (see what I did there?) and started to scream and cry about this travesty of “woke.” Apparently, it’s an “alienating, dangerous and perverse film,” and all of us thinking people “won’t be happy until we are all gay.” One of their special snowflakes, in a rabid attempt to outdo the “musical genius / woke warrior” Kid Rock, has filmed himself lighting Barbie dolls on FIRE. I’d really like to remind him, along with all the boneheads who lit their Nikes on fire and shot up cases of Bud Light for mythical conservative street cred, that Mattel does not give a rat’s ass what you do with that Barbie after you buy it at your local Walmart.
Another dim-witted politician’s wife cried about the movie’s “woke” message at the premier. I’m sorry, but what? Ma’am, you perhaps should rethought your attendance at this event given your RWNJ membership card. Maybe you should find should find something else to be mad about, like the fact that your husband paid for sex with underage girls. But that’s just me; I have different priorities apparently.
Given that the movie achieved incredibly high box office returns this weekend, it would appear that the joke is on team RWNJ. The movie has made history, earning $155 million dollars in its’ debut weekend. This is the highest domestic debut from a female director EVER. Director Greta Gerwig has my mad respect; that’s no small feat at all.
So, mad props to Barbie. I have loved you for years. I will be adding to that movie earning total as soon as possible and will also be bringing my super woke daughters with me as well. I am, after all, a Barbie girl, clearly living in a Barbie world. Though I have not yet gotten my dreamhouse three-floor mansion, I do drive a Jeep. And though I am a ways from 63, I expect to still have the same style and joie de vivre when I hit that milestone.
Keep on resisting, friends!
Resist Invisible 