I cringe when I see her tiny hard body. I’m filled with disgust for her negative influence. She may be unaware, but she has many robotic ambassadors roaming the world in influential places – movies, media, fashion, music.
And she’s at it again. She’s a perpetual iconic figure who continues to regenerate, and live in our brains, and make us very fat.
I’m talking about Barbie.
The doll.
Yes, the doll.
Here’s the latest Barbie to hit the market, ripe for holiday buying by moms, dads, aunts, uncles, cousins and substitute Santas everywhere.
(Getty/Mattel)
Yes, it’s JLo! Jennifer Lopez, the stunningly beautiful, often-described-as-bodacious actress/singer with the positive body image of a true goddess.
Hollywood told her to trim down her derriere and she told them where they could leap.
But, the new Barbie version of JLo has no voice!
Now, you might think “what’s the harm?” or “all Barbies are skinny.” The second statement is true, the first is false.
There is harm. Barbie messes with our minds with her 12-year-old boy’s body with add-on fake boobs. (The designer modeled her after his adolescent son’s body.)
Let me show you how.
Before Barbie became common girls’ toy in the 1960s, this was an actress in America:
Today, actresses, by and large, have one shape:
Yes, it’s Barbie, er, Angelina Jolie with the now-common, standard Hollywood female form: adolescent boy’s body with wide shoulders, no hips, gangly arms and legs, and little derriere. Oh, and add on fake boobs so large they could make you topple over your tiny feet. At least she didn’t bind her feet. If Barbie were human, she’d be more than 35 lbs. underweight at 5’9″ and 110 pounds. Just like Angelina, she’d be in the anorexic category of the BMI scale.
She would be unable to stand upright or support herself on her size 3 shoes, so she would have to walk on all fours.
As one of my female actress clients once admitted, “the rule out here (in Hollywood) is ‘diet until there’s practically nothing left, get bigger implants, and use botox and fillers to fill up your lax facial skin.”
So, you’re probably saying, “Pat, you’re talking skinny! Connect this to EXCESS weight and obesity!”
It’s simple.
In the attempt to fit the implausible body shape and size of most actresses, entertainers and role models, young girls diet. And the dieting age keeps dropping.
- 80% of ten-year-old girls in America have been on a diet.
- 70% of girls 6-12 say they need to slim down. (This is the exact age girls should be putting on body fat in preparation for puberty.)
Both eating disorders and obesity are rising, especially among young women. Body image is the biggest reason women in their twenties give for not enjoying their sexuality.
And body image often doesn’t get better with age:
- 97% of all women say they have at least one “I hate my body” moment a day.
The bottom line is research shows every diet ADDS more weight. We are dieting fatter every year. (99% of those who lose over 25 lbs. on a diet regain the weight. And they regain more than they lose – an average of 109%.)
I’m very familiar with this phenomenon. Before I lost over 90 lbs permanently (see how I teach what I learned), I had lost and regained weight dozens of times. In fact, I dieted my way to 242 lbs.
Here’s Barbie if she were the size of the average 18-year-old girl:
And that pretty much says it all. Mattel didn’t make several Barbies in a range of sizes. When they tried other races, they only changed the skin color. There’s no diversity in Barbie. No acceptance. No range of health. She’s a tyrannical little witch.
And I have to say, I’m a little pissed. At JLo. She has a voice and she’s used it before in defense of a woman’s body righteously being curvy, distinctive, luscious.
She also has a young daughter.
