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My daughter does not need unreal standards of beauty to make her feel inadequate. I refuse to let Barbie raise my daughter, says this post.
While I was growing up, I absolutely loved Barbie. I would beg my mother for a new Barbie every time we ventured into the toy department. As soon as we neared those Pepto-Bismol-pink displays, I would get butterflies and daydream of Barbie’s and my next adventure together.
On one such trip, my mother finally acquiesced and bought me Peaches ‘n’ Cream Barbie. She kept her in the closet and said she would be my birthday gift.
Fortunately (or unfortunately) for me, Peaches ‘n’ Cream sat in her pink box staring down at me with her eternally painted smile through her see-through plastic window. I looked forward to our reunion with eagerness.
When the happy day arrived, I carefully removed Peaches ‘n’ Cream from her packaging, and slowly examined her with the precision of a doctor. She was perfect – waist length blonde tresses, and big blue eyes. Peaches ‘n’ Cream Barbie was beautiful — and I looked nothing like her.
She was perfect – waist length blonde tresses, and big blue eyes. Peaches ‘n’ Cream Barbie was beautiful — and I looked nothing like her.
It’s bad enough that Barbie is a poor anatomical role model for young girls, all unbalanced rack and legs for days. But when I had asked my mother what was meant by “peaches ‘n’ cream”, she shook her head. “I don’t know,” she had replied.
It was years later that I learned the meaning: a creamy white complexion with a blush of peach. Something I would never have. I was thankful my 6-year-old self and my 30-something-year-old mother never knew this at the time.
Now that I’m a 30-something myself with a young impressionable daughter of my own, I am determined that she have a doll who looks more like her. Enter Nahji, from Assam, India. Nahji is part of a collection called Hearts 4 Hearts Girls whose proceeds partially go to helping young girls in the countries they represent, including: Dell (USA), Consuelo (Mexico), Rahel (Ethiopia), Tipi (Laos), and Lilian (Belarus).
I immediately purchased this doll for Pumpkin’s second birthday. Never mind that the box loudly stated For Ages 6+ or that my daughter was more interested in the box Nahji came in rather than in Nahji herself. She has dark beautiful hair and large lovely brown eyes. She is perfect —and she looks everything like us.
This post was first published here.
Pic credit: Image of girl playing with Barbies via Stefano Tinti/Shutterstock.
Jen has always enjoyed visual communications and writing ever since her school spelling bee days. She is passionate about design and the written word. When she's not blogging, playing wife, mom, international politics aficionado, read more...
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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