Is Your Little Girl Okay With Her Little Head?
From The Onion, "Bratz Dolls May Give Young Girls Unrealistic Expectations Of Head Size" -- on BDD (Bratz Dysmorphic Disorder):
Is Your Little Girl Okay With Her Little Head?
From The Onion, "Bratz Dolls May Give Young Girls Unrealistic Expectations Of Head Size" -- on BDD (Bratz Dysmorphic Disorder):
Can't watch just now - I'm at work - but these Bratz dolls turn my stomach. I looked in a Bratz book. It was all about a bunch of girls who did fashion shows, how many clothes they had, and the bad girls who also had lots of clothes but were bad. One of them had more suitcases than all the rest put together! Imagine how bad she was! Perhaps she was good. I can't remember.
I am seriously perturbed by the aspirations that these products impart to our children. It used to be that people made things or wrote stories for children - compare Bratz with "Swallows and Amazons" for example - that were informative, exciting, fun and *for children*. Bratz is *for profit* - their business model is that children are simply there to be exploited.
Norman at January 27, 2009 3:56 AM
Hey, why not? If pressure groups out there are ready to believe that a single Barbie can wreck the sacro-saint self-image of a girl, I don't see the problem of freaking out around a Bratz doll.
Toubrouk at January 27, 2009 6:09 AM
Cute story.
But come on, the Bratz are cute too.
Ok, this coming from a person who spent her childhood in communism. You should have seen the grotesque toys- especially those creepy imported Russian talking dolls. The stuff of nightmares. The Bratz have clothes? Those Communist dolls had war drums.
hipparchia at January 27, 2009 7:04 AM
When I was younger, I thought Christina Ricci was so cool, pretty and someone to aspire to. In 200 Cigarettes, a guy heartboken by her talks about he loves her big head, and ever since then, I wanted a bigger head. Really.
Then the Olsen twins were sticks w/ lollipop heads and so many other famous people were, too. (I'm 25, if this sounds really recent.) I had body-too-large-for-my-head-dysmorphia. Ok, so I wasn't really sick but I did yearn for a thinner body so my head would look more lollipop. (I have an eating disordered history/current issues that are being wrapped up if that helps anyone think I'm not TOTALLY crazy.)
Jessica G at January 27, 2009 7:37 AM
Let me get this right ... Toubrouk says, why not exploit children? And Hipparchia says that Commie dolls are worse so by comparison Bratz must be OK?
Bratz cute? They are grotesquely hypertrophied monsters. It's like feeding kids pure candy because they naturally like sweet things.
I never said little girls have a "sacro-saint self-image," so that's a straw man. I do say that it is up to adults to help children to develop to their fullest potential. These dolls - like Barbie - are aspirational. If all your dolls can do is dress up and pose on a miniature catwalk, then your imagination is not being stretched very far. Their view of adult life is that it centres on shopping, fashion, makeup, boys, showing off, and bitching. We don't need many adults like that, so at some point these little girls realise they've been misdirected, and they're more interested in, I don't know, driving buses, running businesses, curing cancer, being advice goddesses. But it's a wrench. So why not open them up to these more realistic possibilities at an early age?
Before you ask - no, I have no evidence to support this view (apart from having brought up a daughter). Just a gut feeling.
Norman at January 27, 2009 7:46 AM
Thank the gods my girls never asked for these...these... things! Not in my house! They're ugly and they provide nothing more than what Norman says - they're a bad example of something to aspire to.
On a totally different note, daughter #1 has been finding music videos, and the sheet music to go with them, on the internet, and then downloading and playing them! She and one of her friends, who plays guitar, are now in the middle of learning some Billy Joel songs. GO GIRLS! I'm SO proud of them. o.O
Flynne at January 27, 2009 7:55 AM
Flynne - exactly, I know how you feel.
It's a question of whether we teach our kids to be consumers or producers. Bratz are mainly self-centred consumers of fashion products. All they will produce is babies.
Flynne's girls are already interacting with the wider world and producing music.
Norman at January 27, 2009 8:18 AM
...are now in the middle of learning some Billy Joel songs.
That may be almost as bad, if you agree with this guy: http://www.slate.com/id/2209526/
Conan the Grammarian at January 27, 2009 9:11 AM
Let me get this right ... Toubrouk says, why not exploit children?
I guess I must have missed that part when I wrote my appreciation toward child exploitation because I can't find it.
As for the aspirations, at least they got some. Norman, we are living in a world hell-bent on making everything baby-proof. For generations girls had dolls and played make-believe with them around. Most of the time, it was around traditional female roles.
So, what's new with the Barbie thing? Not much. Do you think the teenage girls would stop dieting, shopping, buying makeup and parading for boys if they were unaware that Barbie dolls ever existed? It was present in human history way before the very plastic used in the offending doll was created. What about the "Bitching" thing? As far as I am concerned, bitching is an integrated part of the DNA in women since the dawn of time! It is the counterpart of men phallic fixation on everything, so I am not surprised by this.
There's something perverse about the opposition to Barbie dolls that I saw popping again and again; the driven need to be AVERAGE. Regardless of all the roles Barbie had taken since her creation (she was an astronaut before any real-life woman), the blame always return to her measurements. Yeah, she's thin. So? She was made thin to save on the fabric needed for her clothing. Why beauty is so disturbing?
I am ready to bet a old 5$ bill that the real problem with Barbie do not with the child's body image but the mother who had brought the toy in the first place. Hence the Feminist parade against the toy.
On another point, I can't call on the "Parental Mystique" like you Norman but I was also a kid. I used to play with He-Man toys. Remember those beefy, perfectly steroidal bodies? I had a brunch of them. They never influenced me on my personal image. I am bald, wears glasses, barely 6' and quite intense on the body hair (think "Pelt"). I am also glad that I can see my sexual organs without a mirror. In retrospect, did I felt wounded by the image of those toys? Not at all. In fact, I find them laughable today.
Please lighten up, it's a friggin piece of plastic.
Toubrouk at January 27, 2009 9:43 AM
This fad will only last until one of these girls grows up and gives birth to a large-headed baby -- and blogs about it.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at January 27, 2009 9:43 AM
LOL. i love the onion! i think bratz dolls are cool but waaay too grownup looking for little girls. I wouldn't dare buy one of those dolls for any of my cousins or nieces. they look a little slutty.
Ms. Sassy at January 27, 2009 10:06 AM
I would have loved one of these dolls growing up. Their heads would have stuck on the sharp end of a pencil better.
Nicky at January 27, 2009 10:15 AM
doesn't matter since mattel put a C&D on the compnay that makes Bratz, and won, right?
meh, seems like somewhere along the line you help kids to figure out that toys are not real. That unlike real cars, hotwheels cars can jump halfway across the room, only to be hit outta the park with a baseball bat, and still only suffer minor scratches. That, as similar to what Toubrouk said, action figures are not much like people, especially since you can't re-attach my limbs the way you can with a GI-Joe with kung fu grip. Thankfully nobody engages me in a tug-of-war with a 50 foot tall dog. Likewise my daughter doesn't think her limbs should be able to move like a bedee dolls would, or that she should come equipped with faery wings like one of her barbie dolls does.
Strange proportions? Like saturday morning cartoons? The kids seem to know that you can't drop an anvil on a real person, and that sizes can change depending on what happens in a cartoon... same as with toys.
Don't want to be all literal an' stuff, but don't you think real-world people affect a childs real world perceptions of self? If her mom constantly diets, or binges, don't you think that will inform a girls self image more than a doll will? I do, although it may be crazy talk...
SwissArmyD at January 27, 2009 11:27 AM
If her mom constantly diets, or binges, don't you think that will inform a girls self image more than a doll will? I do, although it may be crazy talk...
Well, yes of course it would, so why buy an exceedlingly fugly doll to further reinforce that self image? (And as for Bill Joel songs, Conan, #1 plays the piano - I'm grateful the lessons I've been paying for all these years are cultivating an interest in playing something other than what her teacher wants her to play. She's also picking up on some of Alicia Keys' stuff, and others'. Now if I can just get into some really good blues, she'll have it made! Dr. John, anyone?) o.O
Flynne at January 27, 2009 11:40 AM
The Onion, is there anything better?
Bratz dolls, for when you want to buy your precious child a slutty looking doll to emulate.
Having a huge melon isn't all it's cracked up to be. Try finding a hat when your hat size is above 8. Or suffer the embarrassment of a snickering supply NCO who, put out from reaching the topmost shelf, breathlessly announces he never had to issue an extra large K-Pot before - in front of all the other Airmen and Soldiers! I was nearly in tears.
el duderino at January 27, 2009 12:36 PM
The Onion, is there anything better?
Bratz dolls, for when you want to buy your precious child a slutty looking doll to emulate.
Having a huge melon isn't all it's cracked up to be. Try finding a hat when your hat size is above 8. Or suffer the embarrassment of a snickering supply NCO who, put out from reaching the topmost shelf, breathlessly announces he never had to issue an extra large K-Pot before - in front of all the other Airmen and Soldiers! I was nearly in tears.
el duderino at January 27, 2009 12:36 PM
Toubrouk - I guessed the exploitation because your "Hey, why not?" comes right after my point about exploitation. You never explicitly advocated exploiting children - so what does "Hey, why not?" refer to?
Re your point about the boys' dolls - yeah, my son had them too. (I predated them, myself.) There are several differences between them and Barbie/Bratz. First, as a male, you are not so concerned about your own body image, as a female is. Second, the boy dolls are called "action figures" not just because boys don't want to be seen playing with dolls, but generally because they had lots of things to do. Barbie was pretty good in that respect, actually. (There's an amazing Barbie Museum in Prague. Is there any way to post some images of it here, Amy?) But as far as I can see, Bratz don't do anything. Here is Jade's life:
Jade's spunky, fun-loving, carefree attitude is what makes her the one in the foursome who keeps things lively. There's never a dull moment with her as she might show up for a movie wearing a skirt made out of some old blue jeans or have her hair done in some wild style. She loves fashion and sometimes puts together fashion shows (making Yas, Sasha and Cloe serve as her models!) for the neighborhood. Walking around with a sketchpad in her hand as she often does means she can be a little bit distracted but that's only because she's concentrating hard on a new design! She laughs at herself all the time because just like her fashion sense, she has a quirky sense of humor as well. If you're feeling blue you can count on her to cheer you up with a really silly joke. Her favorite means of working out is to put on some cool electronic music and show off her new wave dance skills. And she likes to incorporate that music into her homemade fashion shows, too! Family is just as important to her as style and she's never too busy to hang out with her parents and show off her latest designs and hear what's gong on in their worlds. Jade's unique sense of style and attitude makes her the girl everyone admires!
"She laughs at herself all the time." I can just imagine that. Blechh.
Here's another site that I loathe: http://www.missbimbo.com/
Little girls like to do little girly things - I don't have a problem with that. But little girly things are not limited to showing up for a movie in a home-made skirt or doing your hair in a wild style. They include setting fire to things, making websites, going camping, taking your dog to competitions, making a kite, climbing trees, writing down all the numbers from 1 to 1000, and eating worms. Then when she's older, it's scuba, traveling the world, doing a degree, learning to drive, keeping fish, rabbits, cats and any other animals that can't get away, sailing and power boating.
There's a lot more to life than Bratz would have you believe. Bratz just wants docile little consumers. And they have enough psychologists to make their products irresistibly attractive. What a terrible shame for our children. Kids don't need bought off with this junk. They need people who will put in the time to show them the wonderful world we live in, in ways that kids could never think of, or be able to carry out, by themselves. That's parenting.
Norman at January 27, 2009 1:33 PM
I have daughters. They do not use cartoons or toys for self image. These are PLAY things. As young as they are they know this. Geez. Maybe because I actually parent my kids, you know.. talk to them, explain things to them. The realize TV etc. is not REAL. If people actually parented theirs kids, what a wonderful world huh?
Mel at January 27, 2009 5:12 PM
My biggest concern isn't that little girls will have unrealistic aspirations concerning head size, but that they'll want their noses removed! Honestly, how to Bratz breathe with those tiny, tiny schnozzes?
My youngest has two or three Bratz dolls. As far as I can tell, they're just part of her collection, and no more important than her other dolls. I wonder if how they play with the dolls they have is just as important as which dolls they have.
By the way, tangential question: Are Barbie dolls proportioned the way they are to exaggerate their femininity, or to make their outfits look right?
old rpm daddy at January 27, 2009 5:16 PM
Careful about the Saturday morning cartoons. They can be just as influencing How quickly we forgot the Superman years. It was just after the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeves. All the young boys (and a a few girls) loved the movie and how they wanted to be just like Superman. You could not walk down the street without seeing some kid racing by with a dishtowel cape yelling "up, up and aaway". Then the the the - sorry give me a minute.
Then the deaths started happening. Little kids that had jumped off the roof of their house. Like any other fad it started small then grew. Everyday the news was filled with more deaths of little Timmy's and Davey's leaping to their deaths. I remember that one day in September in my small hometown as 9 year old Anthony leaped from a local water tower. I still tear up when ever I see that water tower.
The last straw was the death of little Roy Ericstein from New York. Some how the boy got away from his class during a tour of the Empire State Building and he got over the protective barrier. Other tourists tried to talk the 10 year old down but he insisted that he could fly he just needed a high enough spot. As his teacher and classmates looked on, he screamed out "Look its bird, it's a plane, it's Super-Roy. Stuck his tiny fist in the air and leaped. He landed on a passing tour bus. He fell on to Gladis and Stan Smuckle from Florida, they too died. His parents sued the studio that produced the movie, then the congressional committee of "Superman deaths was formed"...... GIVE ME A BREAK PEOPLE!
GET a clue bat. Children grow up. True they will do weird things, stupid things, and down right "what the fuck where you thinking" things. But 99 percent of them will grow up to be normal people with normal problems or neuroses. True we will lose a few to accidents but in the end it is never that too far gone.
John Paulson at January 27, 2009 6:06 PM
Christ people, it's just a doll. There is no issue here to discuss. The influence some random doll is going to have on a girl's life is negligible compared to the influence her parenting, peers, friends, education and cultural environment are going to have on her. Don't get your knickers in a knot, if you don't like it vote with your wallet and keep it out your kids' lives, it's not "exploitation" and it's not destroying society, dolls aren't that powerful. You're ironically behaving just like this Onion parody. Except it's like you missed the "parody" part. This is an example of when people don't have real problems, they start looking for "issues". Out here in real life there are real problems.
DavidJ at January 28, 2009 1:27 AM
Bratz weren't around when I was a kid, but Barbies were. My neighbor and I didn't make our Barbies shop... we put them in the pond and made them have aquatic adventures, we sent them to the moon, we rescued Ken from the "evil" Barbie (We had 2 Kens for 10 or so Barbies between us, so the ladies played most of the roles). We played sequels to the Little House and Narnia books.
I bet little girls play with Bratz the same way.
Though I will admit, they DO look like hoochie mamas.
NicoleK at January 28, 2009 4:16 AM
We had 2 Kens for 10 or so Barbies between us...
Which would explain why Ken always had that slightly dazed, grinning expression...
old rpm daddy at January 28, 2009 7:29 AM
C'mon, don't like a toy, don't buy it for your kid, its that simple.
Teach your child to love knowledge, learning, and adventure.
Teach them to be respectful and to value respect. Teach them good manners (by example best of all), and to value good manners.
Teach them to respect themselves, and to spend time with people who respect them...and to know the difference between those who do and those who do not.
Teach them to recognize their virtues, but to admit their faults.
Hold them, but don't hold them back.
If you're doing these things, then a little "Bratz" doll, won't make a damn bit of difference.
Its not toys that shape our children, but the words & DEEDS of the caregivers who serve as examples. Toys do not make children into demanding spoiled little "brats" (couldn't resist the pun), parents who try to buy their children's cooperation, teach them that they are entitled to what they want, and teach them self love rather than self respect, and teach them to make excuses for their failings, that nothing is their fault, and forget to teach their children good manners or consideration for others...those are the people that are responsible for spoiled rotten children which become spoiled rotten adults.
"Bratz" dolls...those are just bits of plastic in the shape of girls that our daughters play with.
Robert at January 28, 2009 7:34 AM
I remember age 10...I know 10 year olds...there is something wrong with a 10 year old who thinks he can fly, that has nothing to do with the movies he's seen.
As adults we tend to think of all children as infants, incapable of reason or thought in any serious way. We do our best to remind ourselves that they're growing up (or should), but to think a 10 year old doesn't know anything about how the world works and a movie is to blame just doesn't make sense.
I'm not saying children are just short adults...yes they're impulsive and prone to risk taking, from early ages all the way up into early twenties. But there is a big damn difference between the 10 year old who tries to jump his bike off of a 3 foot high yard into the garden below...and the 10 year old who thinks he could fly.
Suing the film studio makes no sense...suing the people who were responsible for him might make sense...but they'd get to ask the most obvious question in the world.
"Why didn't you tell your child that things in movies are not real?!"
Robert at January 28, 2009 9:31 AM
So, all it takes to get girls to question their self-image is a doll?
And as for Bill Joel songs, Conan, #1 plays the piano - I'm grateful the lessons I've been paying for all these years are cultivating an interest in playing something other than what her teacher wants her to play. She's also picking up on some of Alicia Keys' stuff, and others'. Now if I can just get into some really good blues, she'll have it made! Dr. John, anyone?)
Whatever gets her to play and keep playing. Wish I'd kept at it.
How about introducing her to some Thelonious Monk or Oscar Peterson?
Conan the Grammarian at January 28, 2009 9:59 AM
See, this is what happens.
http://icanhascheezburger.com/2009/01/28/funny-pictures-am-not-bobblehead/
Norman at January 28, 2009 12:16 PM
Sorry people! I got carried away I tried to sound funny then got preachy. I understand it is all a joke! And most people understand that it the ridiculousness of mothers and nanny government people.
It is amazing what some people worry about when there is bigger concerns. Like here in Korea last year we had big protests about American beef and the small practically infinitesimal chance of getting Mad Cow - mothers protested with their children some all worried about their children eating the wrong hamburger yet if they were really worried they would be about car accidents. Korea is number one for children dieing in car accidents. You want to protect your kids quit screeching about monster American beef and teach your kids to cross a street, put on a seatbelt and demand cities enforce driving laws.
John Paulson at January 28, 2009 10:36 PM
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