The inventor of Barbie was an American businesswoman named Ruth Handler. She invented the controversial doll in 1959. She was also the co-founder of the toy manufacturer Mattel along with her husband, Eliot.

Ruth got the idea to create the doll from watching her daughter Barbara play with grown-up paper dolls. A form of play and imagination other than the typical play at the time of a mother figure with her baby dolls. But the idea of an actual beautiful grown-up doll for young girls to play with was an intriguing new idea. And Ruth came across a doll named Lilli while vacationing in Europe that she used as a model to emulate.

Once home, she reworked the doll’s design and named her Barbie after the Handler’s daughter, Barbara. Barbie debuted at the New York toy fair on March 9, 1959, but was unsuccessful. (Barbie debuted wearing a black and white striped one-piece bathing suit.) 

When Disney introduced The Mickey Mouse Club children’s television show, Mattel invested heavily in television advertising. The TV commercials for the Barbie doll paid off, and Barbie rocketed Mattel and the Handlers to fame and fortune.

“Subsequently, they would add a boyfriend for Barbie named Ken, after the Handlers’ son, and many other “friends and family” to Barbie’s world.” – Matthew Tukaki 

Meet Lilli, the High-end German Call Girl Who Became Barbie” by MessyNessy.

“So, it turns out Barbies’ original design was based on a German adult gag-gift escort doll named Lilli. That’s right, she wasn’t a dentist or a surgeon, an Olympian gymnast, a pet stylist or an ambassador for world peace.  She certainly wasn’t a toy for little girls.

SEE ARTICLE HERE

And it is interesting to me that Barbie’s successful beginning had ties to Disney. The sex trafficking station for young children. 

Also, some of the later toy products and accessories that came from Mattel’s Barbie world had sensitive questionable motives. It appeared that some of it was intended for sex education. You be the judge!

There was Barbie’s best friend Midge.

“Turns out, Midge was so controversial at one point in the early 2000s that she was actually discontinued. But who is Midge and what’s up with all the drama surrounding her pregnant belly. The doll was launched in 1963 as Barbie’s bestie. The first version of Midge was discontinued in 1967. The original version of the doll was “not” pregnant.

By the late 1980s, Midge was back on shelves as part of the California Dream Barbie set. Then she was re-released in the 1990s wearing a wedding dress, and again in 2002 with a detachable magnetic pregnant stomach, which allowed her to “deliver” a small plastic baby curled up inside, per CBS News. And that’s where the chaos began.” – Woman’s Health/ Korin Miller

“Growing up Skipper- growing breasts 1975-1979. Barbie’s younger sister, Skipper was created by Mattel in 1964. By the mid-70’s the company decided it was time for her to grow up a bit. When girls rotated Growing Up skipper’s left arm forward, she grew an inch and developed breasts, Rotate the same arm backward, and she went back to pre-pubescence. Creeeepy! Mattel was criticized for sexualizing a teenage girl, which – unlike Growing Up Skipper – isn’t making mountains out of molehills. The doll was a big bust. Let’s hope that Mattel learned its lesson: dolls simply shouldn’t grow up.” – Mox Museum of Failure

“Don’t Eat! Controversial 1965 Slumber Party Barbie came with scales permanently set to just 110 lbs. and a diet book telling her not eat.” – Daily Mail/Martha De Lacey

Barbie perpetuated negative self-image in girls because many do not have the tiny waist and large bust that she has. 

Then there was the (Suntan) Malibu Barbie collection. I had that collection. And I still love to get my summer tan every year. 

“The Palm Beach Sugar Daddy Ken was reportedly a part of the adult Barbie Collector line. However, the name had a different meaning that one could think. His post puppy is where Sugar Daddy Ken actually gets his name from. Ken’s West Highland Terrier is named Sugar. He’s Sugar’s Daddy!” –  Pop Culture/Culture News/ Hannah Malach

“Mattel’s latest Ken doll, (Cock Ring Ken) part of the Earring Magic line of Barbie toys, was openly modeled on gay fashion. And Mattel had unwittingly put a sex toy around his neck.” Pollygon/Tasha Robinson

However, despite these controversies I do have to attest to loving my Barbie dolls as a child. It is true that they helped little girls imagine and dream to be anything that they wanted to be. Ruth Handler was smart in foreseeing this. However, I have to wonder if there was not more to it. In sexualizing Barbie they were also sexualizing young girls. What was their interest in this agenda?

Also, in recreating the role of a woman from mother to worker, the controlling powers could receive more income taxes. And despite the incredible success of many women today as they accomplish both raising a family and having a career, they may not now always have the time to reflect on themselves. And I believe detachment from ourselves is the controlling powers ultimate goal, so that they may be better able to control and brainwash us. Women are naturally intuitive. The powers that be might be attempting to dim their light.

Also, in addition to these debatable Mattel products, Ruth Handler seemed to be a controversial woman herself when it came to business. She had some disreputable charges against her.

 “In February 1978 Handler, three other former Mattel officers, and supervisor were indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiracy, mail fraud, and making false financial statements to the Securities and Exchange commission. Handler and Rosenberg were ordered to pay $57,000 in “reparations” and sentenced to 2,500 hours of community service during their five-year probation period.” – Insider/Grace Dean

“The crimes each of you committed in the opinion of this court are explosive parasitic and I think disgraceful to anything decent in this society,” US District Judge Robert Takasugi said, per The Los Angeles Times. 

And all this information is now surfacing because of the movie “Barbie.” I did go see the movie a few days ago. And it was mostly fun! And I don’t want to be too much of a spoiler, but it did appear to be a battle of the sexes between the Barbies and Kens. If you can call it that with dolls?  A battle between men and women and their place in society. And although I always love seeing empowerment in women, I actually felt a bit sorry for the Kens. They were made out to be such dim-wits, in my opinion. And at one point, they brainwashed the Barbies into being submissive. Although it was just temporary. And the Kens did happily come around and develop some self-esteem in the end. But division seems to be the theme as it is in much of our world.

And I was expecting to learn more of the discovery of their universe. But it would seem that would be Ruth Handler in the Mattel building as the God figure. 

All in all it was a colorful and entertaining movie. But that made it a good manipulative maneuver to put it aside the darkness of Oppenheimer. Because Barbie sells! And now Oppenheimer sells. But it sells lies!

And apparently people are switching from pink to black for the double feature. But I stayed in pink for my single movie feature of Barbie.

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Lisa Hakes is the author of Subtle Sabotage — a candid portrait of alcoholism and autism for readers who appreciate down-to-earth authors who aren’t afraid to tell the whole story.

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