Bratz vs. Barbie

How had I let this happen? It was Christmas 2005 and my then five-year-old daughter had unwrapped yet another Bratz doll, adding it to the pile of scantily clad playthings that well-meaning family and friends had given her.

Just the year before, Barbie had ruled the over-commercialized day. But now my little fashionista (with her three or four voluntary outfit changes a day) only had eyes for Bratz. And not only does that continue to this day, but she's also hardly alone: The Bratz are the No. 2 doll in the country (second to you-know-who) and are clearly winning the buzz war, with their very own live-action theatrical release now playing. When's the last time you caught the blond, leggy one at the multiplex? I can't believe I'm saying this, but I wish she'd come out of the Dream House and make a comeback already -- at least with all those different versions of her (remember Astronaut Barbie? Teacher Barbie?), she showed a little aspiration beyond just looking good in a sparkly dress or leather pants.



All of which begs a lot of questions: What is with these incredibly popular little dolls who just so happen to embody that Britney-esque spirit now imploding in a gossip magazine near you? Are they worth worrying over? Could they be destroying the next generation of females with their future-Maxim-cover-girl look? And most of all, how did they manage to turn Barbie into a good girl, a near feminist icon even, in comparison?



For a while there I'd managed to mostly ignore the Bratz, with their absurdly big eyes on their absurdly big heads. They were undeniably cool, this multicultural array of dolls dressed to the nines in funky clothes that would have made any club girl proud. I reasoned that they were meant for older girls who were more likely to dress that way -- not my little one. What I forgot was that while little girls adore their mothers, there comes a time when they really want to be like older girls. In this case, older girls as embodied by these dolls -- never mind that they look like little hookers. 



"They don't look trashy to me. I think trashy is in the eyes of the adults," said Isaac Larian, CEO of Bratz's maker, Micro Games of America, on Nightline earlier this month. Then there must be something wrong with a whole lot of us because we all see dolls that look, for lack of a better word, a little slutty. And I know I sound like I'm 1,000-years-old when I say things like that, but as a mother who's pushing 35, the line between prude and rational is getting thinner.



Now don't get me wrong. Through the years I had my own issues with blond Barbie, with her unattainable proportions and a gazillion accessories, from her vapid representation of all things fake to the impossible expectations of female beauty that she helped institute. But when it came down to it, I knew her well. I have fond memories of my own collection as a four-year-old in Trinidad, and years later, playing with them in my Bronx apartment. I'm sure the attention and exaltation I gave her contributed to my self-esteem issues as a little black girl who would never have hair like that unless I sewed it on. I had a few of the parade of black Barbies that came on the market, but even as little kids we knew that they weren't "the real thing" and that white Barbie was the one we had to have.



So there is a part of me that wants to accept the multi-culti groove that the Bratz have going on. I should be embracing Sasha with her brown skin, even though her hair is just as impeccably straight and long as the rest of them. I should love the "exotic" looking Yasmin and friends. But something in me resists. Maybe it's that I think they've set feminism back 20 years with things like their TV show and video game, in which they run a teen magazine with money they pick up from the ground or make from photographing each other. Despite the fact that they parrot all manner of girl-power phrases along the way, they are still espousing a kind of emptiness that is particularly dangerous coming from relatable-seeming dolls. Or maybe it's just the queasy feeling I get when I look at the Bratz baby dolls who are inexplicably dressed in baby tees or bikini tops with their diapered bottoms. Even at her most Malibu, Barbie wasn't nearly as sexualized as these dolls are, with their overly made-up faces.



Or maybe it's because I see my almost seven-year-old daughter pulling her cute little-girl dresses and shirts tight in the back, trying to create a waistline while she juts out her hip and strikes a pose, and I realize that no matter how much I keep her away from sexual content on TV and in movies, I can't take it out of her world completely.



The knockdown, drag-out fight between the makers of the two dolls will continue, both in toy stores and in the courtroom. Mattel says the Bratz designer came up with the concept while he worked at Mattel, and the makers of Bratz and the makers of Bratz, MGA Entertainment, say that Mattel's My Scene Barbie is a rip-off of the Bratz. As if that very girly fight wasn't embarrassing enough, MGA also alleged that Mattel tried to corner the market on doll hair. 

But in my daughter's eyes, the war is pretty much won. "Face it, Mommy. Bratz are just cooler," she told me recently, and I missed Barbie, in all her blond glory, a little more.

Originally posted on SirensMag.com.

Comments

[Nasty]

Yuppie Silicon or Multicultural Sass?

I choose sass. My girls (6,8) have Bratz, not Barbie. but I'm hardly afraid to say "Don't be like Bratz".

[xenubarb]

Every time I see an ad for Bratz on Nickelodeon (yes, I watch Spongebob!) it makes me wonder what kind of expectations these toys give little girls.

Surely the little darlings don't expect the kind of birthday parties featured on MTV's "My Sweet Sixteen" program, where indulgent parents spend tens of thousands on a party, right?

Surely they don't all expect to develop huge eyes and big, pouty lips when they hit adolescence, have exotic looking boyfriends to go clubbing with in their limo, or on their very own Harley!

Such is life as portrayed by Bratz. In the Bratz world, nobody is chubby, everyone is in a band, everything is upscale and perfect. What a disappointment that must be for little Britt'ney, whose folks can't even afford a Sponge Bob Bouncy Room for her ninth birthday!

The Bratz are relentless party girls. Some of them come with makeup, so your own brat can practice the skills of looking like a future Hoochie Mama. Certainly something to aspire to!

Meanwhile, Barbie is sprouting wings and tail fins in an attempt to reposition the suddenly-deposed Teen Queen closer to the fantasies of little girls. This is somewhat a Good Thing despite the fact that many little girls will never get a horse named Nibbles or a golden retriever that actually poops! But these are regular girl dreams, a world of dogs, ponies, and boys without penises.

One version Brat comes with "bling"; a tiara set with a genuine, documented diamond chip that Britt'ney can put on her very own finger as a genuine diamond ring!

I can't even begin to list how many things are wrong with this picture. The only thing that could make it worse would be Trey Boo Bratz, a little gangsta rapper who comes with stylish corn rows, an armored Mercedes limo with black windows and his vey' own Mac10 automatic submachine gun. Aight?

[Kansas Evans]

I coming into this a day later, and maybe a dollar short, but . . .

The only Barbie's I have are black, you know, regular Barbie's painted brown. There're two things I like about Bratz: 1) they have minority features, and not just painted Eurocentric features; 2) they come in different shades. There're several shades of brown in the black community where I live, and the Bratz dolls do a better job representing that.

As for the other questions? Thankfully, I don't have kids, so it's not something I have to wrestle with. But, if I ever have a daughter, I'll probably buy her Bratz and change the clothes before she gets to see the box.

[frl]

thank you! my little girl is six, soon to be seven, and i have to keep reminding people that when they give her a gift, ABSOLUTELY NO BRATZ DOLLS or anything pertaining to the bratz dolls allowed! i grew up with barbie, but this blatent sexualizing of children with the bratz is a whole different thing than the unattainable barbie look. i'm amazed that friends look at me like i'm crazy because my child is not allowed to have this doll... their little girls play with bratz.

i'm no prude, my daughter is not being raised to be ashamed of herself or her body in any way.

i wonder why americans in general were appalled at the beauty contests of little girls, but these dolls are selling like nobody's business. they almost seem two steps away from validating people who prey on little children.

[GoodbyeKitty]

Barbie needs to EAT

[BlackCoffee]

The American Girl books are popular with my seven year old. I am lucky that she is into the Littlest Pet Shop toys, and doesn't care for Barbie or Brats. I bought her an animal rescue Stacie, but she couldn't care less about it. I think dolls creep her out.

[yminla]

I vote for neither Barbie nor Bratz. Barbie is the popular air headed cheerleader in high school that ends up marrying way too young and having 4 kids before the age of 25 and Bratz is the rebel slut who ditches class and smokes pot behind the bleachers....No thanks! The lesser of all evils...I vote for American Girl dolls.

[cynara]

Perfectly summed up, that is exactly what barbie and bratz represent.

[frozenskeeter]

I hate the Bratz dolls. I do not let my daughter have them. She has received one from a family member that does not know my stance on this toy, and we thanked her kindly, then tossed it (no, we did not donate it to charity, no child should have this doll). I tell my 8 year old daughter why she can't have the Bratz dolls: the dolls dress and act in a way no child should. She does have a few Barbie's but does not play with them; hoeever, she does have an American Girl doll that she adores and dresses her how she dresses (soccer outfit and all). Parents need to be careful picking out their children's toys, it does have an effect on them.

[ruchild]

I have been on the sidelines watching this one brew out on the shelves for a few years, my child is now 16, so beyond the whole doll thing. She had Barbies, not just hers, but mine as well to play with. She is the 2nd generation Barbie player in my family. My cousins and I used to whole up for days in the basement with our barbies and play, we'd make up towns with our houses, made our own houses and accessories if we didn't have them, heck we even made stairs for the townhouse that didn't have them and put a box on top of that for a 2nd story.
When the Bratz came out my daughter looked at them on the shelves and said, UGH, how ugly is that? Who wants to play with that kind of trash? (Not making this up) and she thought they were way too slutty to be children's toys and she is still a child herself.) She also became a HUGE fan of the American Girl dolls and still proudly displays her Jospehina doll, even though she doesn't play with her anymore, on her shelf, because she loves it that much. She saved up for the doll and I pitched in some money at the end and on holidays and birthdays she got more outfits and accessories. All the girls at her school had these dolls and loved them. It sends a better message to these girls and the books are an added bonus (btw, American Girl Dolls are a Mattel product).
My advice, give your kids a good moral compass by living what you preach, buy the other dolls, and if you have to, buy them the bratz, but have them make their own outfits instead of buying the ones on the shelves, it isn't that hard and teaching them the skill of hand sewing is a lifetime reward alone, think of all the buttons they'll be able to mend!

[wheatstatedem]

I'm so glad to see I'm not the only one that has a problem w/ Bratz dolls. My 7 and 5 year old daughters think my only reason for disliking Bratz is because of their name. How do I even begin to explain that while the name is obnoxious to someone trying to raise kids to be just the opposite, that's actually the least of their offenses. Where to begin: the lipliner, the hoochie-esque clothing, the attitude (or is it bratitude?), the fact that they're just one more example of little girls being sexualized at an increasingly younger age. I've been clear from the get-go that my girls will not own a Bratz doll, see a Bratz movie, etc. Luckily, we've got a few friends that feel the same way, so the peer pressure is less to get one. My only suggestion is American Girl dolls. While expensive, they at least have historical significance and are racially diverse in a good way, not the let's give them "ethnic" names, along w/ straightened hair and horrific lipliner kind of way.

[isis]

That is a funny comment about doll hair law suit. Bratz are bratty in so many ways. Did you know that the better dolls have thinner strands of hair?

[InofTouch]

I think both dolls have there greatness and there flaws. I think more this had to do with perception that where used to with one doll and all of sudden, something new and usual comes this way and we have to start all over again.

[mommadona]

A man designed the doll.
Nothing else needs to be said.

PAPER DOLL
- written by Johnny S. Black, 1915
- lyrics as recorded by The Mills Brothers in 1942

I'm gonna buy a Paper Doll that I can call my own
A doll that other fellows cannot steal
And then the flirty, flirty guys with their flirty, flirty eyes
Will have to flirt with dollies that are real

When I come home at night she will be waiting
She'll be the truest doll in all this world
I'd rather have a Paper Doll to call my own
Than have a fickle-minded real live girl

I guess I had a million dolls or more
I guess I've played the doll game o'er and o'er
I just quarrelled with Sue, that's why I'm blue
She's gone away and left me just like all dolls do

I'll tell you boys, it's tough to be alone
And it's tough to love a doll that's not your own
I'm through with all of them
I'll never ball again
Say boy, whatcha gonna do?

I'm gonna buy a Paper Doll that I can call my own
A doll that other fellows cannot steal
And then the flirty, flirty guys with their flirty, flirty eyes
Will have to flirt with dollies that are real

When I come home at night she will be waiting
She'll be the truest doll in all this world
I'd rather have a Paper Doll to call my own
Than have a fickle-minded real live girl

[Cthulhubob]

Thanks for the smile. Barbie really was the one to look out for, but these Bratz Dolls with the Disco Ball and Stripper Pole accessories are just too much. I just can't help thinking that child sex offenders in-waiting own complete collections.