Hi there :) Hello Kitty says Hello

Today, the Barbie company released new Barbie dolls that embrace the different sizes and colors of people. I can’t figure out whether or not I’m upset that the Barbie corporation had to do this. 

Hear me out, my love for Barbie goes beyond my love for a lot of things. I watched every Barbie movie ever, I have more than 30 Barbie dolls, I always had a Barbie birthday cake for every birthday party my parents threw me, the Barbie car (the Volkswagen Beetle) is my dream car, and I still have my Barbie blanket since I was 2. Barbie was a huge part of my life growing up, she was my best friend. I obviously grew up and the teenage life happened, but I never outgrew my love for Barbie. 

However, I never looked at Barbie and thought, “Gosh, i want to look exactly like her” or made her my beauty standard. I actually loved the way she looked, but never thought anything more than that. Last year, mid 2015, I see an article saying how Barbie’s perfect image is ruining it for girls, and how girls want to look like her because she became the beauty standard. I was super confused because this wasn’t the case for me. I would have never thought that until I read that article, so why are these kids thinking like that? How did Barbie become a “beauty standard”? Who made her that standard? How are little girls just thinking “I want to look like her?” 

I feel that girls have to hear that or see that in order for them to think like that. I did not naturally think or make barbie my beauty standard. I only came to think about the beauty standard when I went into middle school and someone told me that they did not like me because they don’t like “brown people”.