Category Archives: WTFrenchToast

This Girl Scouts for Reality in New Barbie

Girl Scouts Facebook page.

-from Girl Scouts Facebook page.

This week Girl Scouts and Mattel paired up to create a Girl Scout Barbie. Yea I know, for an organization that has been a front-runner, in my opinion, on tackling negative body and self-image and promoting leadership among young girls and teens, I’m struggling to see where this doll fits in their overall mission. But just like everything in today’s world, controversy sells. WHY DOES EVERYTHING HAVE TO BE ABOUT DOLLAR SIGNS INSTEAD OF MORALS.

Any who, way back in the day I was a girl scout, first a Brownie then a Junior, and never did my uniform consist of tight fitting pink capris and heeled boots. In fact, the uniforms were so unflattering and ill-fitting that I didn’t even want to wear it half the time. Perhaps girls still don’t? Check out year 1993 on this lovely timeline of Girl Scout uniforms. Do you blame me!?

On Girl Scouts Facebook page the organization commented that “girls and moms alike associate this doll with the outdoors, camping, giving back in your community, and we think that those are really positive message to all of our girls. What do you think?”

I think those are all great messages for our girls, but this doll in no way portrays those messages. I associate this doll with Mall Barbie or even Miss America Barbie, but instead of a state name block-lettered across her sash there are badges of honor, from all the camping and hiking she must have successfully accomplished in her heeled boots without breaking her ankles (kids, don’t try that at home), full face of make-up, and beret fascinator that seemed to stay perfectly positioned on her head of coiffed hair.

These days, the typical 10 year-old girl looks more like she’s 15 (and acts 18) but since when did Junior Girl Scouts (9-11 years-old) look 20? This doll looks more like a Girl Scout Ambassador (15-17 years-old) or troop leader, not a Junior that she portraying with her green sash.

I trolled through the comments on Girl Scout’s Facebook page regarding this monstrosity of a doll, and one mother offered up her 7 year-old girl scout’s opinion, “She doesn’t look like she would really do real girl scout stuff. Like she would just set back and say ‘I don’t want to get dirty.’ But being a real girl scout is about getting dirty and helping your community.”

I will, however, give kudos to the designer for making her racially inconspicuous, thus making her a doll for everyone, which is something that I like to see! I also have to admit that as an only child I used my imagination and played with Barbie dolls often and never felt inferior because I didn’t look like her, didn’t have that dream house with an elevator or that hot corvette she cruised around town from job to job because I could separate a plaything from reality. I think in today’s unlimited access to media and communications makes it harder for young kids to separate (let alone dissect) what’s falsified and what’s reality. Because even adult women have trouble with this reality and try to obtain the impossible which leads to this. With that said, no, I don’t think this doll is bad to play with, though I’d prefer a doll that looked more like a Lammily, even Skipper would do, but I’d like Girl Scout Barbie to more accurately portray the brand of the organization and reflect the average age of the majority of scouts while wearing a true uniform. And maybe feed her a cookie or two?

What’s your opinion of the dolls and the message it’s sending young girls? Would you by this for your sister, daughter, or niece? Let me know in the comments!

Just when you think we’re moving two steps forward…this happens

from feministing.com

from feministing.com

I’m sure most of you are aware, that today the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) ruled that private companies can refuse to provide contraception medication to their employees based on the company’s religious beliefs. Seriously.  First, I didn’t know companies could have religious beliefs, thought only people could. You know, like women, they’re people. Next, do these religious companies only hire people that mirror those beliefs? If so, isn’t that called employment discrimination? Problemo, numero dos, señor.

To be clear it’s not just about the refusal of the medication, it’s that the government and bosses (which, ew) have rummaged their way into how a woman is going to protect her body, again, HER body. Frankly, it’s none of their damn business to know why a woman takes certain medication, just like it’s none of an employers business to know that a man over 60 requires Viagra to, ahem, keep his wife happy. IT’S AN INVASION OF PRIVACY, hellur.

Also, I don’t think on a job interview a woman should have to ask a health benefit question like, “Do you provide birth control because it’s a medical necessity for my Endometriosis.” Many forget that women don’t just take the pill to protect themselves from becoming pregnant or subsiding a heavy flow, but also for medical necessity. (Dysmenorrhea, Endometriosis, etc.). Through this ruling, women are being punished for being women and that sex has been framed as a crime punishable with pregnancy.

The red lining gets thicker, those Supreme Court Justices who ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood’s mandate were all men. Which you know, infuriates me because just when you think women are taking two steps forward in society, five men wearing robes move us 10 steps back. It’s another example of how our cultural history of having a lack of female representation still creates further shockwaves of inequality.

This one ruling will send a spiral of random “religious beliefs” leaching out of the woodwork of greedy corporations like, “I (because companies are now people, remember) don’t believe in paying people money for their work, I’d rather pay them in banana chips.” But on a more serious note, could corporations stop providing healthcare coverage for LGBTQ people, women who have children out of wedlock, people who have STDs? This one ruling could open up a slew of issues where people’s health and wellness are jeopardized in favor a companies keeping more money in their pockets. Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, can’t say she didn’t warn us in her dissent statement today, “the court I fear, has ventured into a minefield.” They better come up with a Plan B.