Slim to Size Barbie

“I am abnormally uncomfortable about my weight. I see myself as fat even though I'm not. Although I am not fat, I have a massive fear of becoming fat. I turn to obsessive dieting and starvation to control my weight. I pretend to eat, wear bulky clothing to disguise how thin I am, and I hide food I claim to have eaten.”
 
This is what the thought of a person with anorexia might be like. This is the turmoil, the distress, the living hell that they go through every day.
 
This is disgusting.
 
Even worse, 1 – 5% of all female adolesents and young woemen are anorexic. It is rare but not unheard of for girls under the age of ten to have the condition.
 
Many celebrities, such as French model Isabelle Caro, who died at age 28 after starring in several anti- anorexia ads.
 
You may be astounded that the largest cause of this may not be the stick-thin modes strutting around on TV or airbrushed bodies modeled in magazines.
 
Could it be Barbie?
 
Barbara Millicent Roberts. Have any of us girls ever forgotten our childhood playmate? The one where you can brush her hair, undress her everywhere?
 
Barbie was presented as a perfect role model. She is pretty and successful. She lives in a dream house and has the perfect boyfriend, Ken.
 
However, a 1965 ensemble entitled ‘Slumber Party’ came with a bathroon scale permantly set at 110 lbs.
 
‘Slumber Party’ also included a book entitled ‘How to Lose Weight’, which advised, simply, ‘Don’t eat!’
 
Barbie, being five feet, nine inches tall (at a 1/6 ‘playscale’) would be thirty five pounds underweight. Her Body Mass Index (BMI) would be 16.24, which fits the weight criteria for anorexic.
 
She has a dress size all of her own. While her bust might be able to squeeze into a size ten dress, a size zero would hang loose around her hips and waist, failing to show off her 'perfect' figure.
 
In 1997, 99% of girls ages three to twelve had at least one Barbie doll. Those girls would now be age seventeen to twenty six, the age when most anorexic patients are diagnosed.
 
The Next Step
 
With beloved Barbie as a role model, girls will learn that, unless you’re skinny, or even underweight, you’d be considered ‘ugly’, or ‘imperfect’.
 
Because of Barbie’s example, girls may turn to dieting to lose weight. Indeed, 40 – 60% of high school girls have, and the 50% of girls’ age thirteen to fifteen who believe them selves to be overweight probably will.
 
Dieting can be fine if done properly, but a crash fast for days on end in order to lose weight to impress at a dance or date hardly seems healthy. Nor does relying on a handful of diet pills taken twice a day to fit into ‘the perfect prom dress’.
 
But girls won’t stop at pills or fasting.
 
Some dieters will cover their legs or stomach with saran wrap before exercising, expecting better results.
This is a dangerous practice. Your skin is an organ. It is the organ that regulates heat. When you wrap your body in saran wrap, you reduce the body's capacity to regulate heat, and you can pass out, or even die.
 
Yes you will lose weight when exercising in it -- water weight -- but that weight loss will be temporary. As soon as you drink enough fluid to replenish what you lost from sweat, you will be back to your original weight.
 
Using this kind of desperate exercise methods can lead to or be a symptom of anorexia.
 
The Eyes of the World
 
As much as we hate to admit it, we've all been jealous of someone else at one time or another. We hate to admit it because the emotion we feel is a deep, dark, nasty feeling. Jealousy is the surface lesion that hints at the real wound: a sense of personal loss, a lowering of self-esteem and, at times, a feeling of self-criticism. These deeper emotions seep out in the form of anger and they can be really hard to deal with.
I know girls who get up at 4:30 every morning to get ready for school. They stretch, exercise, and then shower. Spend an hour in the bathroom to do their hair and makeup. Search the wardrobe for the perfect outfit, trying on one outfit after another and eventually settling on the original.
 
When these girls go to school, everyone else looks at them with jealousy. They are considered ‘more perfect’ and are therefore people who should be looked upon with envy.
 
Perfectly healthy and smart girls with bad self-esteem look at them and wish to look or be like them. But if that wish could come true, after it does, they would want otherwise.
 
These ‘perfect’ girls will likely struggle through high school and not go to college. Studies show that they will earn more than twenty five thousand dollars less each year than an equivalent with a Bachelor’s degree.
 
These days, a first impression is everything. How does my hair look? Did I put on makeup this morning? Even the strength and length of a handshake is important. A prospective boss analyzes clothing, facial expression, confidence, and more even before flinging the first questions.
 
No matter where you are the eyes of the world are always analyzing you.
 
Because of Barbie?
 
What impact does Barbie have on young girls that spend hours and hours playing with these dolls? Do they want to become like Barbie and look like her?
 
We know that the more time we spend with anything, the more influence it has on us. If you spend weeks studying for a test, you'll probably do better than if you just spend a few minutes studying.
 
I think the same is true with our time. If we spend hours and hours playing with Barbie dolls, they are bound to have an influence on us, just as if we would spend hours and hours playing video games.
 
There is one woman, Cindy Jackson, who was so influenced by Barbie that it became her life mission to look exactly like her. Her obsession to look like Barbie started when her parents bought her first Barbie at the age of 6. And she didn't give up until she reached her goal. She ended up spending about $55,000 and underwent 20 plastic surgery operations to reach her goal of becoming Barbie.
 
20 operations!
 
Jackson had 20 operations just trying to slim to size Barbie.
 
This is just one more example of how impossible it is to reach this ideal image without major alterations of our natural beauty.
 
While Barbie may be a classic toy for young girls, she is a dreadful example of an expected body image for women.