Barbinism

"The Barbie doll always represented the fact that women have choices." This is how the creator of this iconic doll and brand, Ruth Handler, explained and envisioned its impact 64 years ago. 

We are in the month of August, it's summer in the northern hemisphere and cinemas ---empty and forgotten since the pandemic--- are filling up again. Full houses of boys and girls, children, entire families, men and women… to go see the summer movie and one of the highest-grossing films of 2023. There is no media outlet that has not published a column about this phenomenon, nor a television or radio that has not dedicated an entire discussion to talking about the Barbie effect and the impact of the color pink. Just as there is Klein blue, and Ferrari red, now we have Barbie pink.

People, panelists, opinion-makers who in their lives had never uttered the word Barbie or feminism are talking about this movement as if it belonged to them. With apparent opinion, exercising mansplaining in certain conversations. They are starting to talk about patriarchy, about equality of masculinities and about the objectification of women. What the old version of the Barbie doll did. That's how they sold it to us, the marketing campaigns orchestrated from the masculine. 

Ken is the ally of girls, of women. Ken adopts an adventurous, exploratory, and discovering role. He gets into the car of the real world and identifies with Barbie's mission to walk together. Ken is not ashamed to show himself as a team and to question and destroy the columns that support patriarchy. And this, bothers. It bothers women and men; men who do not find themselves located in this era, hybrid, ephemeral, digital, and fluid. Men who see no further than the cute blonde who dresses in pink as if he had left all virility, testosterone, and strength behind. That he does it because he has no character and to please her. The henpecked man of all time. 

The patriarchy, capitalism, vertical structures are turned upside down, and they laugh at stereotypes and conventional education. The film, and all the power of the word and brand Barbie, can have feminist and anti-feminist readings. It is true, it is still a marketing campaign to sell more perfect pink worlds with model blondes and blonds. But it has also managed to make us all talk about this phenomenon, to be curious to read articles we would never have read, to go see the movie... to dress in Barbie Pink to, from the blessed cliché, demand equality.

The pink philosophy invades us to make us feel uncomfortable and to rethink what feminism is. I have feminist friends who won't go see it and think it's nonsense, and older friends than me, and younger ones too, who, with a contagious freedom, have gone with their friends to see it and loved it.

The pink philosophy invades us to make us feel uncomfortable and to rethink what feminism is

The Disney world has done us a lot of harm; they have sold us a perfect woman who must be beautiful, discreet, kind, a good professional, a mother, and a better lover, that Prince Charming exists and that he has to save us. We should demand damages from these screenwriters and producers who have sold us that pink world (the old pink) that does not exist. It has harmed both men and women because it has empowered the bad boy who doesn't express feelings and hides his vulnerability.

The arrival into the world of the real woman, the imperfect one, is symbolized in the movie when Barbie chooses to go to the gynecologist as her first activity, with a certain assertive emphasis. The gynecologist is the symbol of dominating your body, your sexuality, your reproduction, your pleasure, your freedom. The joy of deciding and having all options should be part of that pink philosophy that invades us. Let the invasion begin!