Is Totally Stylin' Tattoo Barbie right for your kids?

Calvin

Calvin

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We’ve all put temporary tattoos on our kiddos, and tattoos are main stream in this day in age, but how would you feel if your child was playing with a Barbie that comes complete with stick-on tattoos, and even a tattoo gun?

Mattel’s Totally Stylin' Tattoo Barbie has hit the shelves, and not very many parents are happy about it.

The tattoo gun can be used to stamp tattoos on skin and clothing.

The same thing happened in 1999 when Butterfly Art Barbie hit the shelves complete with her very own permanent tattoo on her belly. Parents were outraged. Although Mattel didn’t recall the Barbie, plans to include more of Barbie’s friends with tattoos and even nose rings were scrapped.

This time, parents are saying that the tattoo gun is taking the Barbie too far, and that there’s no reason for kiddos to be pretending to give each other tattoos for fear that life will imitate art. Totally Stylin’ Tattoo Barbie is a far cry from the Barbie we were introduced to the world 50 years ago.

Others have rave reviews of the Barbie because it showcases how different generations are now than they were before, and that tattoos are just part of the culture.

The Barbies of the past played in their mansions, drove their cars, did hair, experimented with make-up, wore the latest styles, became surgeons, veterinarians, and even had children. One parent states, "Now she’s teaching our little girls how to apply tramp stamps. Next she’ll have her very own Barbie’s Hot Brothel. Way to go Mattel."

Barbie has long been both an icon and a controversy. Barbie has been blamed for girls with anorexia and bulemia, and has been condemned for teaching children that money and status are more important than internal happiness.

As always, it is up to the parents to choose the right toys for their children. Use your best judgment.
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Portland Parenting Examiner: Is Totally Stylin' Tattoo Barbie right for your kids?

:hmm: what's your opinion on this and would you let your daughter play with this toy?
 
No, children idealize toys they are given and this gives the wrong message to small girls.
 
Barbies have always raised issues...

Her size and shape.... Her Ken doll... The pregnant one, with a baby that pops out of the belly.

Barbies have always been an issue.

It is nothing but a sales pitch! As for parents. If they do not like it. They do not have to buy it for their child.

Barbie and princesses dolls always have been Glamorized.

:roll:


The trouble with Barbie all over the world | Herald Sun

Not to mention dietitians, eating disorder specialists and psychologists, who want society to move away from conceptions of the female figure that do not correspond with reality.

The design flaw that Mattel really needs to address is that Barbie's legs are 50 per cent longer than her arms, whereas the average woman's legs are only 20 per cent longer than her arms.

This means that if Barbie were real, the length of her legs in proportion to her torso would make her unable to walk.

Also, she would be constantly falling on her face. It has been estimated that the only way a human Barbie could walk upright would be to walk on all fours.

Her feet are so proportionately small that her pointy chest would pull her continually forward on to her toes.

If Barbie were human, she would need someone to support her head while crawling around because her neck is twice as long as the average woman's.

Also, Barbie weighs about 45.8kg and is 213cm in height, meaning she would have a body mass index of 10 and would lack the 17 to 22 per cent body fat required for a woman to menstruate or have children, if she wanted them.

Barbie's body would have room for only half a liver and only a few centimetres of intestines, as opposed to the usual 7.9m.

She would suffer from chronic diarrhoea and death from malabsorption and malnutrition.

In case anyone wants to look like Barbie, a healthy woman would need to add 61cm to her height, subtract 15cm from her waist, add 13cm to her chest and 8cm to the length of her neck.

As the late Body Shop founder Anita Roddick said, there are three billion women on the planet who don't look like Barbie and only eight women who come close.
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This is not the whole article. Many other articles if you will google will complain about Barbies.

It is nothing new.


Idealistically and realistically difference here.
 
I have no problems with the barbies....I grew up with them and true enough, barbies are getting more bold each year but I personally think they're better than the Bratz dolls. So if my daughter wants one (If I ever have a daughter) I will let her have Barbie dolls...but not bratz dolls.
 
i have no problems with barbies when i was little girl

IF i have my own kids somedays i would let my kids play barbies but i cant against for rightful as barbies dolls of their ownful! but i can kept barbie doll for my own children in childhood.

mostly parents always complaint about barbies have tattoo i cant comment! that their problems!

my cousin Abby had their own barbie doll and she proud kept dolls for years im too old kept barbies but im past to my cousin Abby she only 11 years old.
 
The bottom line is - It is the parent's responsibility to make a decision. The parents either can choose to not to buy it or to buy it, after all it's their money that will be buying these Barbie Dolls.

This is the 2nd time that Mattel is pitching the Tattooed Barbie dolls on the sales.
 
Jolie77 said:
The bottom line is - It is the parent's responsibility to make a decision. The parents either can choose to not to buy it or to buy it, after all it's their money that will be buying these Barbie Dolls.

This is the 2nd time that Mattel is pitching the Tattooed Barbie dolls on the sales.
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Yup! I agree!!

I feel that Barbies are over rated!

but if the parents wants them to be mature, and play with adult like dolls.

Then it is up to them.

:hmm:

what ever happened to just the usual baby dolls.
 
Jolie77 said:
The bottom line is - It is the parent's responsibility to make a decision. The parents either can choose to not to buy it or to buy it, after all it's their money that will be buying these Barbie Dolls.

This is the 2nd time that Mattel is pitching the Tattooed Barbie dolls on the sales.
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yes, i agree, its up to parents decision to buy it or not for their kiddos. I personally don't care if my kid wanted it or not. My girl isn't interested in barbie dolls.
right, it isn't the first time about the barbie dolls. In reality, i met several mothers who have already had tramp stamp tattoos. so kids must have seen their mothers have it. :shrug: Time has changes over years.
 
Babyblue said:
Barbies have always raised issues...

Her size and shape.... Her Ken doll... The pregnant one, with a baby that pops out of the belly.

Barbies have always been an issue.

It is nothing but a sales pitch! As for parents. If they do not like it. They do not have to buy it for their child.

Barbie and princesses dolls always have been Glamorized.

:roll:


The trouble with Barbie all over the world | Herald Sun



This is not the whole article. Many other articles if you will google will complain about Barbies.

It is nothing new.


Idealistically and realistically difference here.
Click to expand...
I remember reading that years ago. It's kinda messed up how they got all the proportions wrong and people are looking at it the wrong way thinking that they can be like Barbie dolls. :crazy:
 
50-year-old Barbie, based on 'gag toy for men'

Roll out the pink carpet, grab a feather boa and throw open those Malibu Dream House doors. It's Barbie's 50th, and the iconic doll, unveiled today in her latest swimsuit, has plenty to celebrate.

Only this American institution could have inspired Barbara Karleskint, 48, to spend nearly $700 so she and one of her dolls could wear matching red chiffon gowns and capes at an annual collectors gathering.

"Look, we're not as bad as the Star Trek convention people," Karleskint, who lives outside of Orlando, Florida, said with a laugh. Collecting Barbies "brings me joy; that's all I can say. And life's not worth living unless you have some joy."

With 8 million active collectors dotting the globe, according to Mattel, Karleskint is hardly alone.

Since Mattel introduced Barbie in 1959, she has become a household name -- owned by 90 percent of American girls ages 3 to 10 and sold in 150 countries, said Lauren Dougherty, a Mattel spokeswoman. Barbie attracts 50 million visitors to her Web site each month, she added.

Along the way, she spawned a cosmetics line, apparel stores throughout Asia and an entertainment franchise that has sold more than 65 million DVDs. Watch old toys get new life »

Last week, a six-story flagship store opened in Shanghai, China. And a real-life Malibu Dream House, a temporary home tricked out for Barbie's birthday -- including a chandelier made of her hair -- is currently on display in California.

Not bad for a doll that, according to author Robin Gerber, was initially inspired by "a sexually-themed gag toy for men."

The now-legendary doll was conceived by Ruth Handler, a daughter of Polish immigrants, said Gerber, author of the newly published "Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World's Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her." She and her husband, Elliott, owned Mattel until a scandal involving accusations of cooked books drove them out in 1975, Gerber said.

Handler, who died in 2002, used to watch her own daughter, Barbara, play with paper dolls. Then, on a trip to Europe, Barbara became fascinated with a buxom doll that Gerber said was based on a female German cartoon character, named Lilli, who used sex to get what she wanted.

"My guess is she didn't know what it was when she bought it," because at that point, four years after the Lilli doll's release, it had landed in European toy stores, the author explained. Handler took the doll back to the states and insisted Mattel designers get to work.

"Who would have thought," Gerber said. Barbie was thought up by a woman and modeled on a cartoon character "who was essentially a prostitute."

Though the men at Mattel, a company that had never sold dolls before, were skeptical at best, Handler proved to be "a corporate genius," Gerber said. In the three years after Barbie's release, Mattel's worth grew to $200 million, doubling the value earned in the first 20 years of business.

Handler's daughter, now Barbara Segal, 67, is a bit dumbfounded by all the hype.

"It's been quite an interesting ride," she said from her Los Angeles, California, area home. "I can't believe this doll's created all of this."

Barbie's collector line (not what's seen on Wal-Mart shelves) is designed for the grown-ups who still relish Barbie. Many say Barbie is an antidote to adult woes, allowing them to recapture their youth and revisit simpler times. iReport.com: See, share Barbie collections

The woman behind Sandi Holder's Doll Attic in Union City, California, strolled through her 3,000-square-foot warehouse and one-of-a-kind Barbie museum, home to thousands of dolls, and spoke of the visitors who flock through her doors each year. Tour an iReporter's Barbie dream house »

She says the doll can evoke powerful emotions and has seen visitors weep for a lost sibling or childhood friend. But Holder, 51, who gave up a nursing career to pursue her Barbie dream more than 20 years ago, said that while trips to the museum can be emotional, they're also full of laughter and stories.

"No one leaves without sharing a fond portion of their childhood with me," said Holder, who once snagged a record for selling a doll at auction for $27,600.

Barbie, however, doesn't conjure up smiles for everyone.

Though the 11.5-inch doll can't be single-handedly blamed for the eating disorders and body-image issues that plague young women, Ellyn Kaschak, a psychology professor at San Jose Sate University in California, said Barbie, especially given her prevalence, is part of the problem.

"I don't think the concerns are overblown at all," said Kaschak, one of the founders in the 1970s of the feminist psychology field. "Blow her up to normal [human] size, and she'd fall over," she said of Barbie's unattainable figure.

Still standing, however, is Cindy Jackson, a 53-year-old woman inspired by Barbie to do much more than collect dolls and splurge on matching outfits.

Over the course of more than two decades, Jackson has gone under the knife for 13 full-scale operations, including multiple procedures each time, and hundreds of less intrusive cosmetic tune-ups in order to achieve the "all-American beauty" look she said Barbie represents.

She grew up in rural Ohio, "plain and unpopular," she said. "Every real woman around me was a farmer's wife, a factory worker, a mother or a school teacher. ... For me, it was soul-destroying. There was no glamour whatsoever."

And then she met her first Barbie, a vintage doll sporting a bubble cut, "a sidelong glance" and dressed as Jackie Kennedy, she remembered.

"It was powerful," Jackson said from her London, England, home. "I'd never seen a real woman who looked like that, and I thought, 'That's what I want to look like.' "

Concern about Barbie's looks and her values, including materialism -- she has worn about 1 billion outfits, Mattel's Dougherty said -- has at times gained ire from more than feminists and psychologists. The recent release of Tattoo Barbie, for instance, has gotten under the skin of some parents.

But such criticism misses the point of what Barbie is all about, according to diehard fans. iReport.com: Barbie's body is not the issue

"It's not about wanting to look like her. It's about imagining what could be," said Nancy Parsons, of western Pennsylvania, who is chairwoman of the Barbie 50th Anniversary Gala, this year's collectors convention planned for July. "People who say it's a bad influence -- they don't know the imagination that goes into playing with dolls. ... My sister always pretended she was a nurse, and [now] she's a nurse."

All told, Barbie has held down 108 careers, Mattel says. She's been a police officer, a doctor, a veterinarian, an astronaut and a presidential candidate.

Women, by the way, are not the only ones drawn to Barbie. Up to 20 percent of annual convention attendees, who fly in from all over the world, are men, this year's chairwoman, Parsons, said. In her own collector's club there are two of them: "One's a hair dresser, and one's an auto mechanic," she said.

Scott Warren, 45, of Orlando, Florida, will attend his seventh consecutive annual convention this summer.

The "novice fashion fan," as he described himself, has been collecting Barbies for about 14 years and counts among his favorites his Versace Barbie, Ralph Lauren Barbie and Diane von Fürstenberg Barbie.

"I know there's no way I can afford a designer's original, but I think it's cool that my Barbies can," he said.

Barbie has had a long partnership with top designers, 50 of whom jumped at the chance to participate in the Barbie Runway Show in New York last month, bringing life-sized Barbie fashions to the catwalk.

"A lot of them say she was their first client, the first model they dressed," said Mattel's Dougherty. "We thought it was the perfect place to kick off her celebration."
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50-year-old Barbie, based on 'gag toy for men'
 
Well, it appear that more parents from low to middle income, have tattoo. I have meet several! Oh boy.

Well, kids learn how to accept and they will have tattoo anyway. It make good business for tattoo store. ;)
 
PowerON said:
Well, it appear that more parents from low to middle income, have tattoo. I have meet several! Oh boy.

Well, kids learn how to accept and they will have tattoo anyway. It make good business for tattoo store. ;)
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I dont know if i agree with you.. i have seen several old friends of mine and they are in the upper class and do have tramp stamp tattoos. Lots of upper classes have to hide from snobbish people but snobbish people have already had tattoos. :roll:
 
Many women, even mothers, have tattoos...so who cares if Barbie does.


What I want to know is why they haven't made a penis for Ken yet? Poor dude's been a she-male without the male part all these years.
 
deafbajagal said:
Many women, even mothers, have tattoos...so who cares if Barbie does.


What I want to know is why they haven't made a penis for Ken yet? Poor dude's been a she-male without the male part all these years.
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:rofl2:

Barbie doesn't have a hoo-hoo either.
 
At school, I saw the dolls, not barbie..but doll boy have show the real penis and testis. It's perfect exactly same art of real penis. I was like huh why they have to make that doll to have penis? Dolls used to have flat, no vagina or penis but now, they have it. I don't think it's good idea... sorry if it's sound dirty comment but it's true. i was shocked when saw it.
 
deafbajagal said:
Many women, even mothers, have tattoos...so who cares if Barbie does.


What I want to know is why they haven't made a penis for Ken yet? Poor dude's been a she-male without the male part all these years.
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they haven't make barbie vagina too. it's flat. same as ken.
 
Barbie has a lot of issues and drama! LOL!
 
~*Kaelei*~ said:
I have no problems with the barbies....I grew up with them and true enough, barbies are getting more bold each year but I personally think they're better than the Bratz dolls. So if my daughter wants one (If I ever have a daughter) I will let her have Barbie dolls...but not bratz dolls.
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I second that.

I used to play Barbie dolls when I was little and I personally think they were actually good and great role than Bratz dolls. In my opinion, Bratz dolls look like a sort of "sexy hookers". =/ I think it is just awful.
 
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