One of the most fervently held dogmas of the 1969 wave of feminism was that the only reason boys and girls liked different toys was due to sexist socialization. I was young in the early 1970s when androgynous “unisex” fashions were all the rage even in the Sears catalogs, but even then I was skeptical. I mean … come on.
This fashionable belief caused a lot of children’s tears on Christmas morning.
Not me, though. As a rare only child during the Baby Boom, I had plenty of boy toys. So I never begrudged girls their boringly non-awesome playthings, such as Barbie dolls.
But many guys can’t seem to get over their childhood memories of the opposite sex’s appalling, cootie-ridden taste in toys. Hence, many online right figures who complained in 2016 when Ghostbusters, which moved massive amounts of merchandise to little boys in 1984, was remade with actresses are now complaining about Barbie, which has been made with the most perfectly cast lead actress imaginable, Margot Robbie. She memorably played both Tarantino’s quiet quintessence of feminine beauty as Sharon Tate in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and the loud prole ice skater in I, Tonya.
Granted, little girls tend to be slightly less sexist than little boys (thus Barbie keeps around Ken, her decorative but dull boyfriend), but without puberty neither sex would find much interest in the other. But then we’d all be dead, wouldn’t we?
Further, men tend to be more nostalgic about childhood toys and entertainment than women, who instead look forward to the next fashion trend. But Mattel’s venerable fashion doll juggernaut has brought a huge number of sentimental ladies to the multiplex to see Barbie.
The film has been building anticipation ever since jaw-dropping still photos were released of Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling dressed up in late 20th-century neon Rollerblading outfits.