The "Barbie" Figure

The barbie figure is always a controversial topic. Some people will see a barbie and just see a toy for a young girl or boy to play with.

(Gender stereotypes and whether a boy should play with dolls, or whether merely seeing the colour pink as a child is enough to turn one gay is a completely different issue)

Other parent's however, see a barbie and instead see an impossible body standard that will give their child self confidence issues if they don't look exactly like their favorite toy. 

At most kids might use Barbie as a fashion icon, but I don't see any kids starving themselves just because they own a barbie. There has to be some other factor going on there.

I bring this up, because recently, the body image role models debate has started up again as a result of the new Beauty and the beast film. In this new adaptation, Belle doesn't wear a corset because feminism is apparently all about removing corsets from portrayals of 18th century France, and also because no one wants children to be watching films where the princess has an unattainable waist size. (#not so subtle shade at Lilly James's Cinderella.)

Now I have the memory of a sieve, but as a child, I don't particularly remember thinking in order to be Cinderella, I had to look identically like her. Now despite not being able to remember this, I'm pretty sure I didn't, as there are many photos of me dressed up as Cinderella when I was little, and seeing as I am brunette, and Cinderella is Blonde, as a child, it clearly didn't matter to me that we didn't look the same, as long as I got to wear the pretty dress and twirl around to "So this is love"

 My point, not that I'm very good at getting to it, is that it is clearly not the child who has an issue with their favorite toys or characters having thin waists, different hair colours or even being a different race to them, instead it is society who finds these flaws and starts campaigns over them.

Maybe your child does have issues with their body image, but I can guarantee it isn't because Cinderella or Belle did or didn't have a corset, or Barbie did or didn't have a thin waist and if it is, it has to be the result of someone telling them "You can't be Cinderella, you're too fat enough" and if you're that cruel to tell a child that, then you need a good punch in the face.

Instead of arguing over the costume of a fairy tale character, or the chest to hip ratio of a doll, maybe we should be promoting different body sizes in other aspects of the media, like either films aimed for people over 10 (though we all know it's not just 10 year olds and under who go to see Disney films) or models in magazines, as they are much more likely to be the people influencing kids about how they look.

And to think this post started because someone threw shade at a film I love because there were corsets in it and god forbid you have to tell a child what a corset is and why a film character has a thin waist, because that is obviously the only thing a kid is going to take away from a magical story about being kind and finding your true love.

Anyway, rant over.

Till next time followers!