So over on Roosh Valizadeh’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad Return of Kings blog a gentleman named Blair Naso has penned a weird paean to Barbie (the doll, not the Nazi war criminal), suggesting that she is a perfect “inspiration” for girls today.
I suppose it isn’t all that shocking that the kind of men who frequent Return of Kings would be fond of an imaginary woman who doesn’t talk and can’t defend herself.
Naso starts off his post by ridiculing feminists for criticizing Barbie. In his mind, they’re just jealous:
For feminists, what bothers them is that Barbie is beautiful. Feminism is an ugly ideology that overtly seeks to glorify both inner and outer ugliness. …To them, Barbie represents a vile standard of beauty.
In Naso’s mind, Barbie is both a Nietzschean Übermensch (no, really) and the embodiment of a Greek goddess.
Barbie is an over-man to little girls. She transcends reality and inspires admiration. Like Theseus for the ancients and Batman for today’s boys, Barbie goes beyond what a normal person can do. Barbie is not a standard; she is an ideal. She inspires aspiration, not imitation. Barbie is the modern Aphrodite.
Here’s a famous statue of Aphrodite from back in the day. Despite being, you know, a literal goddess, her proportions are a bit more human than Barbie’s.
Naso really seems to have a thing for Barbie:
If characters like Indiana Jones are the apex of masculinity, then Barbie is the same for femininity. She is beautiful, intelligent, domestic, social, gorgeous, hard-working, wealthy, attractive, outgoing, healthy, confident, pretty, talented, lovely, has great tits and hair, accomplished, alluring, charming, elegant, unblemished, graceful, and committed to only one man.
Apparently Naso, like Barbie herself, hasn’t caught on to the blindingly obvious fact that Ken is gay. Also, what about Allan, Brad, Curtis, Todd, Steven, Darren, Derek, Kurt and Ryan? Everyone knows that Barbie is riding the smooth flat crotch area carousel.
As Naso sees it, it’s men, not women, who are the real victims of our “fascist beauty standards.”
Men have to grow muscle, which is a journey that is painful, expensive, and filled with misinformation. And if he’s under six feet tall, his chances with women are drastically cut no matter what his other characteristics.
Women on the other hand have to buy an exercise video and keep their hair long. I suppose make-up can be time-consuming, but fashion is not nearly as expensive as women like to claim.
And if some women develop eating disorders trying to live up to the beauty ideal, well, they have no one but their own inferior female selves to blame.
It would be both mentally and physically unhealthy for a man to obsess about achieving the impossible body of Beowulf. So if Barbie and Aphrodite inspire women to turn to unhealthy practices (like eating disorders or fad diets) in a way that He-man doesn’t to men, then what does that say about women?
Either it is a lie that strict beauty standards cause women to obsess at the risk of their own health, or it is manifest that women are mentally and emotionally inferior to men.
Anyone who really wants to be a hottie needs to work for it.
Both anorexia and fat pride are shortcut cheats to beauty. Mature adults achieve what they want through hard work.
Naso does acknowledge that beauty standards are more “stringent” today. In a spectacularly ludicrous leap of logic — the intellectual equivalent of Evel Knievel’s famously failed jump over the Snake River canyon — he blames this on … ugly women.
My guess why beauty standards are a little more demanding today than they were 100 years ago is because today women are ugly. They are overweight, they have bad hair, they lack social grace, and they think hideous products are fashionable by sole virtue of their popularity. Women and little girls know this instinctually and over-correct through their fantasies.
Perhaps little girls love Barbie and Ariel so much because they see how frumpy mommy and their teachers at school are.
And it is the evil feminists who are keeping these little girls from living out their over-corrected fantasies dreams.
Women just want to be beautiful and have a beautiful life. Barbie gives them the inspiration to achieve their dreams. Then feminism sweeps along and tells them to remain stagnant.
In case anyone here needs inspiration, this song should help.
Drive by linking:
http://www.cracked.com/blog/8-a242423oles-who-show-up-every-time-word-feminism-used/
WWTH: It made me giggle that the first person on that list was Tommy Wiseau.
Of the Batman actors, Christian Bale and George Clooney (sigh, I guess I have to acknowledge that he was Batman for today) would be considered Adonises. Val Kilmer and Ben Affleck are considered handsome but not ridiculously idealized. Michael Keaton and Adam West have never been famous for their looks. Compare that to all the actresses who played Catwoman: Julie Newmar, Eartha Kitt, Michelle Pfeiffer, Halle Berry, Anne Hathaway.
I have known high school/college age girls who distinctly claim preference for tall guys, but claiming equivalence between short men/fat women is absurd. When a handsome actor is short no one frames their attractiveness as “handsome despite being short.” No one asks Tom Cruise how he feels about being a sex symbol despite being 5′ 7”. No one cares that James Dean was 5’8. Compare that to Marilyn Monroe, who people have tried to reclaim as a plus-size model despite having had a 22-inch waist (her dress size was inflated because of her large chest and hip measurements). Or Christina Hendricks, who actually is a size 14, and have people asking her about her body all the freaking time.
I’ve been lurking here for a long time, and I don’t know why I feel compelled to make this my first comment, but…
“…and they think hideous products are fashionable by sole virtue of their popularity.”
Fashionable is a synonym of popular. Considering that this fuckwit used seven synonyms for beautiful in his initial description of Barbie, you’d think he’d be familiar with the concept.
So by this oh-so-insightful article, if men want to build muscle, they have to work out, and eat very precisely, and sort through a lot of bad health advice.
If women want to lose weight, they also have to work out, and eat very precisely, and sort through a lot of bad health advice. Plus, to look pretty, they also have to maintain long hair. Plus put on makeup. Plus invest in fashion (which is apparently not *as* expensive as people complain, implying that it is indeed a lower degree of expensive).
And this apparently means men have it harder, but are yet somehow way less emotionally affected, when it comes to beauty standards.
Do you even logic, bro?
WatermelonSugar
Yup. And even then plus-sized clothes are fugly as hell. Beige and floral prints. EVERYWHERE.
Not to mention all men’s clothing sizes make fucking sense. Pants? Waist size and leg length.
Women’s pants?
At this store/for this brand, I’m a sixteen, for this store/brand I’m an eighteen, for this store/brand I’m a “Large”.
Women’s fashion is fucking weird and expensive. It’s mostly geared towards making you buy at a store that makes your clothes seem smaller than they actually are (since brands can set their own sizes), and purchase more accessories. (Fake pockets usually means a purse purchase.)
I was blessed to have a fashion teacher and business owner for my Entrepreneurship class in college. I learned so much.
It’s funny that MRAs seem to claim that they know (and only they) how a beautiful woman has to look like. Nevermind anyones personal preferences, that doesn’t matter. And of course not how a woman wants to be seen.
It’s always so apparent how they can’t wrap their head around the idea that there are women in the world who do not live solely for male approval.
Also: If Barbie was a real person!
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/life-size-barbies-shocking-dimensions-photo-would-she-be-anorexic/
http://static1.puretrend.com/articles/1/75/15/1/@/866813-point-par-point-l-infographie-revient-637×0-2.jpg
She would walk on all fours, be missing some of her intestines, and she can’t lift ANYTHING because her wrists would snap.
But yeah, Barbie is TOTES REALISTIC U GUIZ.
But what if you get stuck with the barbie that has an unhealthy oreo fixation?
http://wac.450f.edgecastcdn.net/80450F/thefw.com/files/2012/03/Oreo-Barbie.jpg
I can’t say that I’ve ever looked at my daughter’s Barbie dolls and thought “Gee, those are great tits.” That’s a bit disturbing.
Or Roosh’s worst nightmare, tattooed Barbie!
http://www.vanishingtattoo.com/images/tattoo/tattoo_barbie.jpg
Hey, guess what? Blair Naso is the poet laureate of the manosphere!
Which is funny, because I tried to read the whole post, thinking it would be entertaining. It was actually a bit hard to read. Even my lady brain needs logic and clear writing now and then.
Also: WELCOME CHEERIO INCIDENT.
Please claim your welcome package in the side bar by clicking on the scented fucking candle.
My executive summary:
“I know next to nothing about women’s lives and I lack empathy, but I decided to think about these issues superficially for a couple of seconds and pontificate as if neurons were really firing in my brain. The world would look better to me if everyone just fit into the little boxes I’ve decided for them.”
Yeah, because who’s ever heard of men going to unhealthy lengths in order to look like the unrealistic depictions of male bodies in media?
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the leading men’s advocacy movement!
As a former athlete I was under quite a lot of pressure to build muscle and being a rower, my short height got in the way of my performance. I didn’t feel better about myself by shitting over girls and women at large. I learned to love myself, accept my physical flaws and strengths and just love the person who looks at me in the mirror.
Concepts that are clearly beyond any of the MRA ilk.
Re: Barbie Bronies
I think there is such a fan base, although a small one, around the show Barbie: Life in the Dreamhouse. The show is actually pretty hilarious.
Posted, without irony, on a blog aimed at getting lazy men laid with as little effort as possible. Mostly by attempting to devalue the “product”.
Dude, it’s a gym, not the Oregon Trail.
Also, huge muscles are actually a turn-off to many women. There’s a point of diminishing returns at which adding more muscle doesn’t add more attractiveness.
This, on a site that micro-analyzes womens’ jaw lines, critiques wrinkles, obsesses over waist-to-bust ratios, graphs fertility practically down to the hour, rates women by race, complains about hair, ranks body types by what shape fruit they are, and on and on and on. These guys love to bitch endlessly about the slightest imperfections because they think it makes them sound like knowledgeable, choosy livestock buyers who deserve only the best breeding stock.
Somehow, I don’t think spending $10 on a DVD and never cutting our hair is going to transform us into supermodels in their estimation.
Math is hard!
Oh. Nononono, not… Brobies!!!!!11!
I’m overweight, but I have fantastic hair. So there!
Maybe let the cats off the hook for this one. I know my cat would just bat them around until they wound up under something else (usually the stove) and then forget about them.
I am not girly.
I never wear make-up.
I don’t do dresses very often, and rarely wear skirts. I recently (ok 3 years back) discovered male clothing sizes, and…wow!
I can buy fitting jogging pants by waist and leg length!
I can buy a belt by waist length rather than varying standards of small/medium/large!
I like plain tshirts or shirts, and you cannot buy female ones like that!
But in the men’s area…you can!
OH MY GOD SO MUCH RAGE.
I’m a dude. I had an eating disorder. It was in no way a cheat code to getting thin. It was a cheat code to getting horribly sick, obsessing constantly over food (for three fucking years I never stopped thinking about food) to fucking up my metabolism and digestive system, and to looking, objectively, like complete shit. It didn’t take “willpower” it took actual and literal insanity – including things like pronounced paranoia and dissociative episodes – to live with anorexia.
And yes, more boys and men are suffering from it. Also from dysmorphia where they see themselves as weak and not muscular enough. And I’m sure these guys are really concerned about it and want to help other males who are suffering. /sarcasm
I’ve honestly never had a problem with Barbie. I’d play with her along with my Ninja Turtle action figures and any other toy. Maybe it’s because I grew up watching the early direct to DVD Barbie movies that were surprisingly progressive, what with the constant passing of the Betchdel test, a focus on female friendships, Barbie playing an active role in the plot, and one protagonist even forgoes marriage to follow her dreams (Barbie and the Princess in the Pauper, if you must know). I had a ton of Barbies, but I don’t blame my body issues on owning a vaguely female shaped hunk of plastic. I’m not saying that she is realistic, because she isn’t, not by a long shot, but, when I was five, I didn’t really differentiate between that doll and my Ninja Turtle toy when it came to realism. Most of my self consciousness comes not from a hunk of plastic, but from the portrayal of overweight people in the media, and the value of women being placed on just her looks. Is Barbie a factor in teaching a young girl that value? Probably a part of it, but it’s more than just the doll. The focus in gender roles when selling toys is everywhere.
They always bring up He-Man. They never bring up that He-Man was one instance where a character was purposefully designed to promote a certain body image for boys.
There’s more history there than just-another-character-sold-to-boys. And they take this “If we’re not complaining about this one case where it was done purposefully, you shouldn’t complain when it’s a matter of course”
When, in fact, they should be complaining.
Oh yes!
I also have an eating disorder (I think..I can go days without eating without noticing and have ended up hospitalised through it)
I am also fat.
I always feel a little pang of sadness when Barbie gets trashed (or, in this case, weirdly celebrated) for being anti-feminist. Yes, it’s absolutely true that her body proportions are unrealistic, and she perpetuates a troubling image of femininity as inherently tied to fashion and materialism. She ain’t perfect by any stretch.
But then, before Barbie came on the market, nearly all dolls were baby dolls, and the default play-mode for little girls was to play house and pretend to raise a baby. Barbie was kinda revolutionary when it comes to girls’ playtime: she was an adult, who went shopping and drove a car and did stuff. Girls could act out a much wider variety of scenarios with Barbie than they could with baby dolls.
From the beginning, Barbie has never been married, and has never had children. Ken is a boyfriend, not a husband; Skipper is her little sister, not her child. She’s a single woman in charge of her own life– it’s Barbie’s dream house, Ken just lives in it. For all her faults, Barbie introduced the first major alternative to the marriage-and-motherhood narrative inherent in toys for girls.
Reasonable people can disagree, certainly, about whether Barbie’s impact is mostly good or mostly bad. But she gets a pass from me.
@Swales Same here, for pretty much the same reasons.