The effect that Barbie has on children from the past and now

Barbie was made on March 5th 1959, and ever since then Barbie has been a huge success among young children. From 1959 the classic Barbie doll has always been tall with long skinny legs that have a large thigh gap. The Barbie had a very thin body with white skin, long blonde hair. To summarise this, Barbie was very well proportioned. Recently Mattel has introduced new Barbie dolls that are mixed raced and have darker skin, they are shorter, curvy and have different hairstyles.

In the past…and now... In the past Barbie was a tall white doll; every child had one and played with one. Many children have said that they wished to be like Barbie and that when they wanted to grow up they wanted to be exactly like the doll. In the past when Classic Barbie and Classic Ken (Male Barbie doll) were out many children took a shine to them a bit more than others. Some children grew up and had huge cosmetic surgery to their faces and body to make them look like the perfect classic Barbie.

For instance, Valeria Lukyanova was a Ukrainian model before getting cosmetic surgery on her body. As a young girl she had a large collection of dolls. She won ‘Miss Diamond Crown of the World’ in 2007, which had 300 contestants. After this competition, she then received many invitations to photoshoots and interviews in the Russian media. She received the name of real life Barbie after she posted photos and videos about herself on the internet. She has done many makeup tutorials on how she achieves her Barbie-like makeup look. Justin Jedlica is another example, he is known as ‘the human Ken’. He has undertaken many cosmetic surgeries starting from when he was 18 years old with a nose adjustment. As a teen he watched Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, this inspired him into using contouring and surgery to enhance the look of his body to make him appear to be just like Ken. He has had over 190 cosmetic procedures including, thigh implants, bicep implants, tricep implants, brow shaping and lifting, cheek enhancement and chest implants resembling the classic Ken Barbie doll who has chocolate brown hair, white skin and a thin and muscular body.

An eight year old stated “Most of our Barbie’s are super skinny. These ones are bigger and I like big Barbie’s.” Many have also said that they look like people they see walking down the street; this can create a more realistic expectation for young girls about their bodies when they grow up.

In conclusion, the recent Barbie dolls made by Mattel are much more realistic as they look like the people in the streets rather than the classic dolls featuring their skinny white legs and long blonde hair. Overall Mattel has changed the Barbie dolls so that they create a more realistic and healthy image of a female and male body.