Barbie book sends girls the wrong message-Lori says no MERGE

[jebandpunky]

Bet the Duggar girls get books like this http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology ... en-4654422

[Loveday]

Coincidentally, this is the topic of today's rant blog post by Lori. One guess as to what she thinks of its message. :roll:

[browncoatslytherin]

our eye rolling smiley does not roll its eyes hard enough for this article

[jerkit]

Lori is extremely upset about this for no good reason.

[sparkles]

Given that my 24YO daughter (who has no prior coding experience) is currently attending a web developer/coding bootcamp and is running rings around everyone in her class, including men who DO have experience, this makes me stabby.

I guess math really WAS hard for poor Barbs. :roll:

[polecat]

Lori is dumb.

(I'm going to put that in every time I comment re: her).

The problem isn't that Barbie needed help fixing her computer. The problem is that COMPUTER ENGINEER BARBIE needed help *from men* fixing her computer.

Also can't help flashing back to Lori needing male help just to get out of the damn house when a fire was approaching, and my eyes roll so far that they are at risk of rolling right out of my skull. Lori likes when women are portrayed as incompetent because LORI IS INCOMPETENT.

[Firiel]

But someone re-wrote the Barbie book!

http://www.themarysue.com/barbie-remix/

[BrownieMomma]

Computer Barbie needs men to fix her laptop.

WTF. Do people not know of Rosie the Riveter? How can what happened during WW2 with women taking up work in factories and other "man" work not impact and influence today's life.

[browncoatslytherin]

But someone re-wrote the Barbie book!

http://www.themarysue.com/barbie-remix/

i love this :D

[MandyLaLa]

I expect nothing less from Barbie/Matel. And I think if you give your child a Babrbie intending it to model "feminism" you're just asking for a let down.

FYI, if you were to make a woman with Barbies body proportions her tits are so big and waist so tiny, she'd fall over and be unable to stand.

[Bluenoser]

Eh, It didn't really bother me. I think a few people read too much into. What bothered me the most was that Barbie appears to be portrayed as a graphics artist, not a computer engineer. I don't think the men are the enemy, Barbie made a mistake, some guys were nice enough to help her and she is back on her way to achieving her goals.

It's not like they asked her for a BJ and refered to her as "Tits" the entire time they were fixing her computer.

[Mandysue]

Not to start anything but why does everything have to be a big deal? Barbie needed help, she got it but OMG it was from men.

Can't a book just be a book? A doll just be a doll?

Do we as children really have unrealistic expectations of life because of Barbie :roll:

[Firiel]

Not to start anything but why does everything have to be a big deal? Barbie needed help, she got it but OMG it was from men.

Can't a book just be a book? A doll just be a doll?

Do we as children really have unrealistic expectations of life because of Barbie :roll:

A book is never just a book. Every text is a reflection of or dialogue with the culture that produced it, including the norms and biases of that culture.

[Bluenoser]

A book is never just a book. Every text is a reflection of or dialogue with the culture that produced it, including the norms and biases of that culture.

Could it though? It's not possible that those choices were simply arbitrary?

[Firiel]

Could it though? It's not possible that those choices were simply arbitrary?

Short answer: no. ;)

I will give you a real answer when I am on a computer next-- I'm sure tomorrow sometime. I can't do my typical wall o' text on my phone!

[GeoBQn]

Computer Barbie needs men to fix her laptop.

WTF. Do people not know of Rosie the Riveter? How can what happened during WW2 with women taking up work in factories and other "man" work not impact and influence today's life.

Lori has complained about the detrimental effect of women working in factories during WW2. Basically, it seems that she would have been ok with the Nazis winning as long as American women stayed at home.

[DGayle]

It would have been nice if her friends Brian and Jennifer helped, but my problem with this book is that Barbie's getting praised for work she didn't do. It's a dumb book that I don't think is still in print.

[jaelh]

Could it though? It's not possible that those choices were simply arbitrary?

Sure. No doubt those choices are as arbitrary as the ones made in the books/illustrations below:

[louisa05]

This was published in 2010 and had already (prior to the current internet handwringing) been pulled from shelves. You can't buy it. But the author, who realized early on that she should have used different characters to help Barbie (those were established Barbie characters--it was not random), is getting threats via social media.

I have been in dozens of elementary classrooms in the last five years and one day ended up, as a sub, doing inventory in a preK-3 library. I have NEVER seen a Barbie book in a school. Not as part of the library, a classroom library or brought in by a student.

The reach of this thing is likely very small and shrinking.

But what really bugs me in all of this is all the people who still do not realize that for young children, Barbie is not a role model. Neither is anyone on television. Or the guy who comes in and does a $3500 + expenses one hour assembly (I know a guy who does this and thinks he is changing lives...). The strongest role models in the lives of children are the adults who are in their lives on a regular basis: parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, teachers, and other adults close to them. A Barbie book won't tell your daughter she can't code if the adults around her are showing her something different.

[jebandpunky]

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/ ... _doll.html

(I can't say one way or the other but a comment on barbie's facebook page claims publishing dates on the book are from July 23,2013)

https://m.facebook.com/BarbieNAD?_rdr#! ... 8259326972

[lilwriter85]

From yesterday

lorialexander.blogspot.com/2014/11/huge-firestorm-over-barbies-new-book.html

A mother bought her two small daughters a book called Barbie: A Computer Engineer. Barbie begins having trouble with her laptop because a virus collapsed it. Two of her male friends come over. "It will go faster if Brian and I help," offers Steven. "Great!" says Barbie. The boys fix the computer for her. Nice story, right? Wrong!

A woman wrote a blog in response to the book and it that went viral. {I won't link to it since it uses foul language.} This blog called this book "insulting" and "dangerous for young minds." Online people completely agreed and one woman wrote, "Thank you, Barbie...for showing me that it's A-OK for women to sit back and let men take care of everything." Another editor of something replied, "We want our young girls to feel they're capable for anything and everything without question."

The Barbie book's author was shocked at the reaction. She made Barbie's friends males "since computer technology is a male dominated field...in no way trying to degrade women by doing that." Mattel, the publishers responded, "The book was published in 2010. Since that time we have reworked our Barbie books. The portrayal of Barbie in this specific story doesn't reflect what Barbie stands for..." Mattel has said that the book has been discontinued. {source}

Therefore, a blog post went viral because it portrayed Barbie as the helpless victim who needed boys "gasp" to come to her rescue. THIS used to be the story line for many romantic books and movies in the past. Men would ride in on their horses and rescue damsels in distress. Oh no! Not for today's liberated women. We need to be able to fix everything and do everything by ourselves because, "We are women. Hear us roar!"

You can't even find this book on Amazon anymore last I looked because this will just destroy young girls and cause them to think that men can help them or maybe even rescue them. We have SO emasculated men and their roles as protectors and providers that it is downright UGLY and we wonder why men no longer want to open doors or treat us with respect!

I LOVE that Ken can fix the computer when it breaks. He fixes many things for me and I appreciate it so much. I like having a man around to help in time of need. I can't lift heavy things so I ask the men in my life to help. They'll put up my Christmas tree for me next week. They change my heavy water filters for me when they need changing. My boys use to change the oil in our cars. They even open jars for me! Men are the ones who build homes, buildings, jets, highways, etc. They are the mechanics, electricians, and plumbers. I have NEVER minded calling a man to fix any of these things. Have you?

I'm sorry but this has gone too far. Everyone gets offended over anything and everything. Gays want the Duggars off of television because they believe in traditional marriage the way God intended it to be. Little girl books get pulled off of shelves because boys come and help Barbie. Am I going crazy or is this sheer stupidity???

Lori, I don't mind men fixing certain things for me and I know some men that don't a lot manual labor things too. Also there are men who can't fix computers and they will admit to it and they will send their computers to be fixed by whoever is capable of doing it. But I've had personal computers and work computers fixed or least diagnosed by women. I hope Lori pays a visit to an Apple store and sees at least one woman at the Genius bar helping people out. Also there are women working in other vocational trades.

[AnnieC 305]

Yes Lori, girls can fix computers. I was a computer repair tech for a good ten years, I just don't do it anymore because I was a Mac tech and my husband insisted on picking the house computers. :roll: I told him I don't do Windows.....

[BrownieMomma]

I feel that lately all I do beat the single mom drum but the fact is.. I do exist.. I am a Christian.. and me and my children are just as important to God as Lori and her family.

Lori has such a narrow, small mind. Since Ken stays married to her, and he hasn't had an accident or died, she only sees the world one way. I shudder to think how the heck Lori would cope with life if Ken died or ditched her for a trophy wife.

Why the extra helplessness? Read frontier stories, those women weren't helpless shrinking violets, heck no they worked hard physical labor. Military wives routinely cope with life while their husbands are on tour.

Why the pretense that women can't do things? That it is somehow unwomanly? I happen to be good at driving and computers. I am still feminine, have never even thought of myself as tomboyish.

Men can do things too. My 16yo cooked dinner night before last. His turn. *shrug*

[guitar_villain]

Sigh. I work in IT, and three of the five people who work for me are female. The students we've hired to do classroom construction over the summer are all female, except for the one guy we had to fire because he wasn't a good worker. My boss at my old job was female. About half of my counterparts at other schools are female.

I guessed I missed the memo saying that only men can work on computers.

[feministxtian]

I don't get the problem Lori has with women who have "typically masculine" skills. Barbie could have fixed her own damn computer.

I'm the resident mechanic, plumber, electrician, heavy-lifter, computer guru, chief cook and bottle washer. My husband does the lion's share of the housework. I hate doing it. I mean I HATE doing it. And...I'm sort of a slob. He does what he's good at (cleaning and organization) and I do what I'm good at (repairs, DIY, cooking). To me, that's the TRUE definition of a "complementary" marriage. But, then again, I looked in the dictionary for the definition of "complementary" instead of asking Kenori.

I'm a "retired" military wife. I've done it all because I had to do it. When the hubs was on the other side of the world (literally), its not like he could have rushed home to do something. I have a bumper sticker "Navy Wife...toughest job in the Navy". Trust me, that ain't bullshit.

Kenori and those sorts make me sick...they've twisted things beyond what the Bible says. I've read it...I see no conflict between what I do and what's in the bible...