1
00:00:01,120 --> 00:00:04,280
Speaker 1: Welcome to you Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff

2
00:00:04,280 --> 00:00:14,760
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Wait wait, wait, wait wait, um, we

3
00:00:14,800 --> 00:00:18,000
Speaker 1: have to talk about our TV show. That's right. We

4
00:00:18,079 --> 00:00:21,080
Speaker 1: have a television show that's coming out on our beloved

5
00:00:21,160 --> 00:00:26,360
Speaker 1: science channel UM. January nineteen at ten pm follows the

6
00:00:26,400 --> 00:00:31,000
Speaker 1: premiere of Idiot Abroad Season three UM, and after Idiot

7
00:00:31,000 --> 00:00:33,720
Speaker 1: Abroad at ten pm Eastern Standard Time will be the

8
00:00:33,760 --> 00:00:38,760
Speaker 1: world debut of Stuff you Should Know, the TV show.

9
00:00:39,200 --> 00:00:42,800
Speaker 1: Not one new episode, but two new episodes back to back,

10
00:00:43,040 --> 00:00:47,320
Speaker 1: ten o'clock and ten thirty. That's right, Saturday night, January nineteenth.

11
00:00:47,360 --> 00:00:48,879
Speaker 1: It's gonna be pretty neat. What are we doing? What

12
00:00:48,960 --> 00:00:50,479
Speaker 1: are the people gonna see? Are they gonna see a

13
00:00:50,520 --> 00:00:52,320
Speaker 1: game show, which we've been asked. Are they going to

14
00:00:52,440 --> 00:00:56,920
Speaker 1: see a a reality show which we've been asked, No, Josh,

15
00:00:57,160 --> 00:01:01,360
Speaker 1: They're seeing a scripted TV show that features the real

16
00:01:01,440 --> 00:01:05,280
Speaker 1: us playing ourselves along with actors on a set that

17
00:01:05,319 --> 00:01:09,480
Speaker 1: we recreated of our office. It's basically an office comedy

18
00:01:09,520 --> 00:01:14,160
Speaker 1: about our lives as podcasters, featuring the podcasting itself and

19
00:01:14,480 --> 00:01:17,280
Speaker 1: real knowledge and factual stuff. So we think it's a

20
00:01:17,319 --> 00:01:21,880
Speaker 1: good combination of fun and humor and facts and uh,

21
00:01:22,160 --> 00:01:24,240
Speaker 1: we think you'll like it. Yeah, we hope you'll like it.

22
00:01:24,360 --> 00:01:29,880
Speaker 1: Um that's January nineteenth, Saturday, ten pm. Uh the world premiere.

23
00:01:30,360 --> 00:01:33,400
Speaker 1: And uh, don't forget to check out Idiot Abroad season

24
00:01:33,440 --> 00:01:36,920
Speaker 1: three absolutely premier before. Very funny show. And for those

25
00:01:36,959 --> 00:01:40,280
Speaker 1: of you clamoring that you don't have TV or cable, you,

26
00:01:40,520 --> 00:01:44,560
Speaker 1: if you have a computer device, can watch this on iTunes.

27
00:01:44,600 --> 00:01:47,760
Speaker 1: Now you're going to be able to purchase these, I

28
00:01:47,800 --> 00:01:50,760
Speaker 1: believe the day after each episode is released and go

29
00:01:50,840 --> 00:01:54,400
Speaker 1: to iTunes, buy it for bucket and watch it on

30
00:01:54,480 --> 00:01:59,640
Speaker 1: your laptop. Nice and Science Channel is so cool they're

31
00:01:59,640 --> 00:02:03,000
Speaker 1: making the first episode available for free. Yeah, that's pretty

32
00:02:03,040 --> 00:02:07,040
Speaker 1: awesome on iTunes, just to get your hooked. So we

33
00:02:07,080 --> 00:02:12,880
Speaker 1: appreciate the support. And now on with the episode, sir, Yes, hey,

34
00:02:12,919 --> 00:02:16,240
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles

35
00:02:16,360 --> 00:02:20,440
Speaker 1: w Chuck Bryant and that stuff. You should know. Two

36
00:02:20,440 --> 00:02:25,880
Speaker 1: of us together, the anatomically Correct Doll Models version. I

37
00:02:25,960 --> 00:02:29,480
Speaker 1: guess I called myself a doll model once in a while,

38
00:02:30,040 --> 00:02:34,160
Speaker 1: a little perk, you know, very looking very kin like

39
00:02:34,200 --> 00:02:40,440
Speaker 1: these days. Sure, um, hey man, not magic your akin, No,

40
00:02:40,680 --> 00:02:45,840
Speaker 1: we'll get to that. Like shavedkin. UM. So, I know

41
00:02:45,919 --> 00:02:48,160
Speaker 1: you know this, but I'll tell you again. Back when

42
00:02:48,160 --> 00:02:50,880
Speaker 1: I was a little pup, I had this series of

43
00:02:50,880 --> 00:02:54,320
Speaker 1: books that were very, very significant in my life, the

44
00:02:54,400 --> 00:02:57,360
Speaker 1: Uncle John's Bathroom Reader. I would get one for Christmas

45
00:02:57,400 --> 00:02:59,880
Speaker 1: every year and I would like go through it and

46
00:03:00,080 --> 00:03:02,120
Speaker 1: first hour I had it and my legs would be

47
00:03:02,200 --> 00:03:04,840
Speaker 1: numb in the bathroom. When you first got these, I

48
00:03:04,840 --> 00:03:06,959
Speaker 1: think I started I was about twelve. I love that

49
00:03:07,000 --> 00:03:09,320
Speaker 1: your parents knew that you were just a sponge for

50
00:03:09,480 --> 00:03:11,520
Speaker 1: information even at that age. Yeah, I don't remember how

51
00:03:11,600 --> 00:03:13,680
Speaker 1: I first came about it, but like I think somebody

52
00:03:13,720 --> 00:03:15,240
Speaker 1: got it for him and they were blown away at

53
00:03:15,280 --> 00:03:18,200
Speaker 1: how much I liked that. Um And it really helped

54
00:03:18,639 --> 00:03:22,320
Speaker 1: shape me in many many ways and the way I

55
00:03:22,440 --> 00:03:24,480
Speaker 1: understand things, the way I look at things like this

56
00:03:24,760 --> 00:03:28,080
Speaker 1: general knowledge. I've had some right, some wrong, but like

57
00:03:28,160 --> 00:03:30,280
Speaker 1: it's been a big deal what you do in the

58
00:03:30,280 --> 00:03:35,760
Speaker 1: bathroom reading. UM. So, this this episode is kind of

59
00:03:35,800 --> 00:03:39,480
Speaker 1: special to me because all this material we're doing, how

60
00:03:39,560 --> 00:03:45,320
Speaker 1: Barbie Doll works, almost all the materials from Uncle John's

61
00:03:45,320 --> 00:03:48,119
Speaker 1: Bathroom Reader. They got in touch with us and gave

62
00:03:48,240 --> 00:03:51,520
Speaker 1: us everything they have M Barbie, and we compiled it

63
00:03:51,560 --> 00:03:55,320
Speaker 1: into this podcast, and we actually have a special guest later,

64
00:03:55,720 --> 00:03:59,360
Speaker 1: the founder of the Bathroom Reader Institute, Gordon Jovna, is

65
00:03:59,400 --> 00:04:01,320
Speaker 1: going to be joining us on this to talk about

66
00:04:01,320 --> 00:04:03,880
Speaker 1: Barbie two. Very excited and they're also kind enough to

67
00:04:03,920 --> 00:04:07,120
Speaker 1: give us hats and I think shirts as well. Right, yeah,

68
00:04:07,160 --> 00:04:10,040
Speaker 1: because they listened to us, and we found out they listened.

69
00:04:10,440 --> 00:04:12,920
Speaker 1: I was like, you were kidding, Like the circle of

70
00:04:13,000 --> 00:04:16,880
Speaker 1: life is complete, Like we hear from Mad Magazine, Archie comics,

71
00:04:17,160 --> 00:04:21,839
Speaker 1: damn interesting, damn interesting? Have we heard from crack yet? No?

72
00:04:22,640 --> 00:04:25,080
Speaker 1: We love them. They're They're the one people, the one people,

73
00:04:25,400 --> 00:04:27,279
Speaker 1: the one group out there that I would like to

74
00:04:27,279 --> 00:04:29,839
Speaker 1: contact us. That's it, just the one, just them. And like,

75
00:04:29,960 --> 00:04:32,400
Speaker 1: very man, I've been whole enough for Obama. I know

76
00:04:32,480 --> 00:04:35,480
Speaker 1: he listens. Don't even pretend Obama, just send us an email.

77
00:04:35,480 --> 00:04:37,279
Speaker 1: Well yeah, you know, I remember when they released what

78
00:04:37,440 --> 00:04:40,640
Speaker 1: was the contents of his iPod one year and we

79
00:04:40,640 --> 00:04:41,920
Speaker 1: were both like, oh my god, we on it. We're

80
00:04:41,920 --> 00:04:43,440
Speaker 1: on it, like of course we're not on it now

81
00:04:44,680 --> 00:04:47,640
Speaker 1: still alright? Um oh and before we get storry, I

82
00:04:47,680 --> 00:04:49,560
Speaker 1: want to give a shout out to one of our

83
00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:53,080
Speaker 1: horror fiction contest entrants. Remember we said, if you publish something,

84
00:04:53,200 --> 00:04:56,240
Speaker 1: let us know and we'll tell everybody. Um, Jay McMurray

85
00:04:56,320 --> 00:04:59,440
Speaker 1: submitted his story The Mind Reader. It was very good. Yeah,

86
00:04:59,440 --> 00:05:01,440
Speaker 1: that was a good one. And he's got it up

87
00:05:01,440 --> 00:05:06,200
Speaker 1: on Amazon dot com and you can search um Jay McMurray,

88
00:05:06,880 --> 00:05:09,080
Speaker 1: m C m U R R Y and the Mind

89
00:05:09,080 --> 00:05:11,680
Speaker 1: Reader and it will bring it up for you. Um.

90
00:05:11,720 --> 00:05:14,520
Speaker 1: He's self published. So it's pretty awesome. Awesome, So way

91
00:05:14,560 --> 00:05:18,320
Speaker 1: to go, Jay, thanks for letting us know. Uh so, Barbie, Yes,

92
00:05:18,720 --> 00:05:22,839
Speaker 1: it all started with a lady named Ruth Marianna who

93
00:05:22,880 --> 00:05:27,080
Speaker 1: eventually became Ruth Handler. She grew up but I guess

94
00:05:27,160 --> 00:05:32,080
Speaker 1: kind of poor in Denver, Colorado. Uh yeah, Well her

95
00:05:32,080 --> 00:05:35,240
Speaker 1: mom was ill, and I have the feeling that it

96
00:05:35,320 --> 00:05:37,640
Speaker 1: was just her mom. Yeah, so she ended up having

97
00:05:37,680 --> 00:05:40,679
Speaker 1: to go live with her sister at a fairly young age. Yeah,

98
00:05:40,720 --> 00:05:44,000
Speaker 1: and um, at a young age as well, met her husband,

99
00:05:44,080 --> 00:05:47,360
Speaker 1: be Elliott, and they moved to California, as New Leo

100
00:05:47,520 --> 00:05:51,520
Speaker 1: EDGs did in the nineteen thirties with you know, prosperous

101
00:05:51,800 --> 00:05:55,960
Speaker 1: land out their opportunity and they had a very long

102
00:05:56,080 --> 00:06:00,680
Speaker 1: lasting marriage and business partnership years for de great it

103
00:06:00,839 --> 00:06:04,240
Speaker 1: is great. Um. Elliott turned out to have a knack

104
00:06:04,320 --> 00:06:09,400
Speaker 1: for creating giftwear, specifically to start picture frames, wouldn't picture frames?

105
00:06:09,880 --> 00:06:12,440
Speaker 1: And Ruth turned out to have a knack for marketing

106
00:06:12,480 --> 00:06:16,920
Speaker 1: and merchandizing them. That's right. And uh they together for Mattel,

107
00:06:17,200 --> 00:06:21,000
Speaker 1: which sounds familiar, I imagine. Yeah, well with Harold Mattson.

108
00:06:21,600 --> 00:06:24,120
Speaker 1: That's where the matt came from. Nice and the l

109
00:06:24,240 --> 00:06:29,320
Speaker 1: was Elliott, very nice. That's nice. And uh they also

110
00:06:29,520 --> 00:06:31,960
Speaker 1: had a couple of kids named Barbie and Kent. Yeah,

111
00:06:32,560 --> 00:06:34,040
Speaker 1: there you have it. We should just end it right

112
00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:36,800
Speaker 1: there the end. That's how Barbie works. That's pretty cool.

113
00:06:36,839 --> 00:06:38,640
Speaker 1: That was a nice little factoid. Well. I think one

114
00:06:38,680 --> 00:06:40,920
Speaker 1: of the things that I think is interesting about Barbie

115
00:06:41,040 --> 00:06:44,800
Speaker 1: is that the Barbie doll was directly inspired by Barbie

116
00:06:44,839 --> 00:06:49,760
Speaker 1: handler Ruth's daughter, Um Barbie used to play with Barbie,

117
00:06:49,800 --> 00:06:52,440
Speaker 1: the real girl used to play with dolls. She had

118
00:06:52,480 --> 00:06:54,920
Speaker 1: like her little baby dolls, and she had, um, you know,

119
00:06:55,120 --> 00:06:57,880
Speaker 1: little girl dolls or whatever, because that's all that was available.

120
00:06:58,360 --> 00:07:00,799
Speaker 1: But she also played with paper doll and these paper

121
00:07:00,839 --> 00:07:02,679
Speaker 1: dolls were kind of fashion dolls, so they were older,

122
00:07:02,760 --> 00:07:06,120
Speaker 1: mature women, and they had different outfits and apparently Barbie

123
00:07:06,200 --> 00:07:09,040
Speaker 1: was just crazy for him. So Ruth went to her

124
00:07:09,040 --> 00:07:11,480
Speaker 1: colleagues at Mattel and said, we need to come up

125
00:07:11,480 --> 00:07:14,200
Speaker 1: with a three dimensional doll that you can change outfit.

126
00:07:14,240 --> 00:07:16,600
Speaker 1: It's going to be a huge hit. And all of

127
00:07:16,600 --> 00:07:19,239
Speaker 1: the male suits poop poo did it's a boo boo,

128
00:07:19,440 --> 00:07:23,280
Speaker 1: Sit down, get me some coffee, lady exactly. And UM

129
00:07:23,360 --> 00:07:25,240
Speaker 1: she was like, all right, well fine, I'll see you

130
00:07:25,280 --> 00:07:28,000
Speaker 1: all in Hell. Yeah. Well, they did poopoo it for

131
00:07:28,080 --> 00:07:31,120
Speaker 1: a legitimate reason, though they said it was not possible

132
00:07:31,160 --> 00:07:33,920
Speaker 1: to manufacture it. UM. I don't think it was just

133
00:07:33,960 --> 00:07:36,200
Speaker 1: poopoo ing her idea, although there was probably some of

134
00:07:36,280 --> 00:07:41,560
Speaker 1: that mixed in. UM. Luckily, Europe called and the handlers

135
00:07:41,560 --> 00:07:44,400
Speaker 1: went on a European vacation and I think ninety six,

136
00:07:45,040 --> 00:07:47,280
Speaker 1: and while they were in Looser in Switzerland, they were

137
00:07:47,320 --> 00:07:50,480
Speaker 1: in some toy shop. I guess that happened to be

138
00:07:50,520 --> 00:07:54,960
Speaker 1: selling a German doll called the Lily Doll. And Lily

139
00:07:55,440 --> 00:07:57,560
Speaker 1: was based on a UM I guess you could call

140
00:07:57,600 --> 00:08:01,680
Speaker 1: it a body comic strip. And this doll that was

141
00:08:01,720 --> 00:08:06,280
Speaker 1: based on the strip was meant for men as maybe

142
00:08:06,280 --> 00:08:10,720
Speaker 1: the like as a host's gift for a stag party

143
00:08:10,800 --> 00:08:13,280
Speaker 1: or something like that. I get the impression you got

144
00:08:13,360 --> 00:08:16,440
Speaker 1: him in shops of ill repute at the time. Did

145
00:08:16,480 --> 00:08:19,800
Speaker 1: you look up Lily looks like Barbie, it looks like

146
00:08:19,840 --> 00:08:22,440
Speaker 1: Marlene Dietrich. That kind of ripped it off, although I

147
00:08:22,480 --> 00:08:24,720
Speaker 1: shouldn't say that because I might get sued. And we

148
00:08:24,760 --> 00:08:26,960
Speaker 1: should also say, as you'll find out why in the

149
00:08:27,040 --> 00:08:29,520
Speaker 1: Nazi distant future, that every time we say Barbie there

150
00:08:29,560 --> 00:08:34,000
Speaker 1: is an implied registered trademark symbol following it. All rights

151
00:08:34,240 --> 00:08:38,240
Speaker 1: to Mattel. We claim zero rights or copyrights on Barbie

152
00:08:38,400 --> 00:08:44,520
Speaker 1: or her products. Right. So Lily was a prototype and um,

153
00:08:44,559 --> 00:08:45,920
Speaker 1: you know, she was a grown up lady that you

154
00:08:45,920 --> 00:08:48,280
Speaker 1: could change the clothes on. And she was like, you

155
00:08:48,320 --> 00:08:50,280
Speaker 1: know what, this is what we've been wanting, this is

156
00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:53,360
Speaker 1: what I've been waiting for. It's possible to manufacture these,

157
00:08:53,840 --> 00:08:58,040
Speaker 1: and I want to make Barbies at Mattel because a

158
00:08:58,080 --> 00:09:00,560
Speaker 1: woman has choices. In the fact that you can change

159
00:09:00,559 --> 00:09:03,640
Speaker 1: your clothes proves it, right. It took a little convincing,

160
00:09:03,840 --> 00:09:07,160
Speaker 1: but she got Mattel. The other guys at Mattel on board. Yeah,

161
00:09:07,200 --> 00:09:10,400
Speaker 1: they resisted because the of the large breasts on the doll. Yeah,

162
00:09:10,400 --> 00:09:12,679
Speaker 1: they basically said, no, mom's gonna buy a doll with

163
00:09:12,760 --> 00:09:15,440
Speaker 1: breast for her daughter. Remember, there is nothing like this

164
00:09:15,640 --> 00:09:18,000
Speaker 1: out there at the time, at least in America and

165
00:09:18,200 --> 00:09:21,160
Speaker 1: even in Europe. The one doll that was like this

166
00:09:21,280 --> 00:09:23,960
Speaker 1: that Barbie was based on was based on a sexy

167
00:09:24,000 --> 00:09:27,040
Speaker 1: comic strip exactly, so it wasn't for little girls. So

168
00:09:27,320 --> 00:09:30,000
Speaker 1: this is a really revolutionary idea for a handler would

169
00:09:30,000 --> 00:09:31,680
Speaker 1: be like, no, no, Well they'll get past it, Like,

170
00:09:31,720 --> 00:09:33,960
Speaker 1: this is what we need to do. Got Mattel on

171
00:09:34,000 --> 00:09:37,400
Speaker 1: board and debuted this thing at the Toy Fair in

172
00:09:37,480 --> 00:09:40,760
Speaker 1: New York City in nineteen nine and a zebra stripe

173
00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:45,200
Speaker 1: striped bathing suit. Yes, very alluring, I guess, and her

174
00:09:45,280 --> 00:09:47,680
Speaker 1: eyes were cast to the side. She can never meet

175
00:09:47,720 --> 00:09:52,800
Speaker 1: your gaze, which as a sidebar, no, like it will

176
00:09:52,840 --> 00:09:55,760
Speaker 1: never meet your gaze. The only way for no, the

177
00:09:55,800 --> 00:09:59,520
Speaker 1: only way for eyes in a painting or on a

178
00:09:59,559 --> 00:10:02,760
Speaker 1: doll to meet you is for them to already be

179
00:10:02,800 --> 00:10:05,320
Speaker 1: painted looking ahead. If they're painted looking to the side,

180
00:10:05,360 --> 00:10:07,439
Speaker 1: they'll never meet you. Well, unless you turn the doll

181
00:10:07,480 --> 00:10:09,760
Speaker 1: to the sun. I'm telling you. You try you try it.

182
00:10:09,880 --> 00:10:12,200
Speaker 1: You've told the story about the painting. Let's still disagree.

183
00:10:12,480 --> 00:10:16,360
Speaker 1: So in the Shinto religion, um anything that has eyes,

184
00:10:16,400 --> 00:10:20,080
Speaker 1: including a doll, can capture your spirit. So in Japan

185
00:10:20,480 --> 00:10:23,559
Speaker 1: a lot of dolls are made with sideways looks so

186
00:10:23,679 --> 00:10:26,840
Speaker 1: you can't look them in the eye. And every year

187
00:10:26,880 --> 00:10:28,640
Speaker 1: and you keep your spirit at the right at the

188
00:10:28,679 --> 00:10:33,559
Speaker 1: Meiji Shrine in Japan, they have a doll burning celebration

189
00:10:33,640 --> 00:10:36,840
Speaker 1: where they burned unused, an unwanted dolls so that they

190
00:10:36,880 --> 00:10:42,840
Speaker 1: can't get anybody. That's an environmental nightmare. So Barbie debuts

191
00:10:42,840 --> 00:10:46,560
Speaker 1: in nine right, yes, they she goes to Sears because

192
00:10:46,640 --> 00:10:49,640
Speaker 1: they sold tons of Mattel products at the time. Sea

193
00:10:49,720 --> 00:10:52,320
Speaker 1: said this thing is too sexy. No one's gonna buy them.

194
00:10:52,320 --> 00:10:56,600
Speaker 1: It's too sexy. So uh, Mattel turned out to be

195
00:10:56,679 --> 00:11:00,160
Speaker 1: smarty Pants though, because five years later Barbie was a

196
00:11:00,160 --> 00:11:02,600
Speaker 1: million dollar dollar I guess because of all the internet

197
00:11:02,720 --> 00:11:05,320
Speaker 1: orders that they were getting, well the little kids. Finally

198
00:11:05,360 --> 00:11:07,920
Speaker 1: some stores said yes, okay, we'll take them, and little

199
00:11:08,000 --> 00:11:10,040
Speaker 1: Kids sold them. In that first year, Chuck, they sold

200
00:11:10,080 --> 00:11:13,040
Speaker 1: three hundred and fifty thousand of these things, and they

201
00:11:13,040 --> 00:11:15,520
Speaker 1: were selling them for three bucks apiece, which I looked

202
00:11:15,520 --> 00:11:19,280
Speaker 1: at three and two thousand eleven dollars. So there was

203
00:11:19,320 --> 00:11:22,040
Speaker 1: a substantial amount of sales for the first year, so

204
00:11:22,160 --> 00:11:25,240
Speaker 1: Rick Handler was proven right pretty much out of the gate. Yes,

205
00:11:25,400 --> 00:11:29,240
Speaker 1: that is true. Um, the cool end of Ruth story

206
00:11:29,720 --> 00:11:32,320
Speaker 1: actually not so cool because she died of cancer. But

207
00:11:32,600 --> 00:11:36,000
Speaker 1: she um eventually got breast cancer, and when she was

208
00:11:36,080 --> 00:11:41,080
Speaker 1: unable to find a breast prosthesis that she thought was

209
00:11:41,080 --> 00:11:43,360
Speaker 1: was good enough, she said, you know what, I'm gonna

210
00:11:43,360 --> 00:11:45,679
Speaker 1: make my own and I'm going to form a company

211
00:11:46,200 --> 00:11:50,000
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna call it Nearly Me. And they manufactured

212
00:11:50,080 --> 00:11:54,320
Speaker 1: breasts prosthesises for cancer survivors. Pretty cool. She sadly lost

213
00:11:54,320 --> 00:11:56,600
Speaker 1: her battle, but I think she was like in her

214
00:11:56,679 --> 00:12:01,400
Speaker 1: late eighties or mid eighties, and even after the Handlers

215
00:12:01,400 --> 00:12:05,360
Speaker 1: were basically forced out of Mattel after some questionable earnings

216
00:12:05,360 --> 00:12:09,400
Speaker 1: reports in the late seventies early eighties, she's still regarded

217
00:12:09,440 --> 00:12:13,360
Speaker 1: like this titan of the toy industry, legend of this

218
00:12:13,400 --> 00:12:16,720
Speaker 1: woman who like helped build Mattel from scratch and like

219
00:12:17,240 --> 00:12:19,520
Speaker 1: made it what it is today. And I think Elliott

220
00:12:19,520 --> 00:12:22,280
Speaker 1: just passed away last year. He lived into his nineties.

221
00:12:23,480 --> 00:12:26,160
Speaker 1: So we have a few stats here, Uh, New Barbie

222
00:12:26,200 --> 00:12:30,080
Speaker 1: All today sells approximately every three seconds. See just sold

223
00:12:30,080 --> 00:12:34,280
Speaker 1: one another just sold one. Uh. It is a one

224
00:12:34,280 --> 00:12:37,400
Speaker 1: point five billion dollar business for Mattel and the average

225
00:12:37,440 --> 00:12:40,800
Speaker 1: girl from three to six has twelve of these. That

226
00:12:41,000 --> 00:12:45,120
Speaker 1: is mind boggling. Number One Barbie from uh and called

227
00:12:45,160 --> 00:12:50,480
Speaker 1: you about twenty seven grand these days, and uh what else?

228
00:12:51,160 --> 00:12:55,600
Speaker 1: The best selling Barbie of all time was the totally

229
00:12:55,640 --> 00:12:58,840
Speaker 1: hair Barbie who had hair from head to toe. It

230
00:12:58,880 --> 00:13:01,240
Speaker 1: strikes me as strange. That's the best selling Barbie of

231
00:13:01,280 --> 00:13:04,200
Speaker 1: all time. I looked it up. It's it's for guys

232
00:13:04,200 --> 00:13:05,920
Speaker 1: like us. You look at this thing and say, wow,

233
00:13:05,960 --> 00:13:08,880
Speaker 1: what a redneck doll like? Has anyone been into the

234
00:13:08,880 --> 00:13:11,640
Speaker 1: Crystal Gale look since with the seventies? But I think

235
00:13:11,679 --> 00:13:15,559
Speaker 1: little girls uh enjoyed like styling the hair, all that

236
00:13:15,600 --> 00:13:17,440
Speaker 1: hair and all the hair that you could do all

237
00:13:17,480 --> 00:13:20,880
Speaker 1: these interesting things with. So Barbie herself, if you want

238
00:13:20,920 --> 00:13:22,960
Speaker 1: to know a little bit of a backstory, if anyone

239
00:13:23,000 --> 00:13:26,040
Speaker 1: ever asks you, Barbie's full name, Barbie the doll, Yes,

240
00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:28,560
Speaker 1: not the daughter. We're no longer talking about the doll. Now,

241
00:13:28,880 --> 00:13:32,280
Speaker 1: we're talking about Barbie the doll in this weird fake history,

242
00:13:32,800 --> 00:13:35,640
Speaker 1: and it's strange. It's a little weird. Yeah, that's why

243
00:13:35,880 --> 00:13:37,840
Speaker 1: we went in and then we're coming back out for

244
00:13:37,840 --> 00:13:40,760
Speaker 1: a second. But Barbie's real name is Barbara Millicent Roberts

245
00:13:41,040 --> 00:13:44,240
Speaker 1: apparently um, which is my aunt's name, not her middle name.

246
00:13:44,280 --> 00:13:48,400
Speaker 1: But her name is Barbie Roberts Um. And she hails

247
00:13:48,520 --> 00:13:53,559
Speaker 1: from not my aunt, but the Barbie doll hails from Willows, Wisconsin. Yeah.

248
00:13:53,600 --> 00:13:58,360
Speaker 1: And she has friends, specifically and most notably Ken Shawn Carson,

249
00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:03,160
Speaker 1: who was induced in nineteen sixty one. They're both pisces

250
00:14:03,200 --> 00:14:06,920
Speaker 1: I guess, like me, I think so. And they're both

251
00:14:07,120 --> 00:14:10,880
Speaker 1: early March. Well I'm mid March. Another cut office sometime

252
00:14:10,920 --> 00:14:13,160
Speaker 1: in March, though, so, but they were both born in March.

253
00:14:13,800 --> 00:14:19,000
Speaker 1: We'll call him pisces um. And uh, Barbie has some relatives.

254
00:14:19,000 --> 00:14:21,800
Speaker 1: Her best friend is Midge, by the way, who's been

255
00:14:21,840 --> 00:14:24,800
Speaker 1: introduced a couple of times pregnant and really caused controversy

256
00:14:24,880 --> 00:14:27,920
Speaker 1: both times. Yeah, one time with an actual baby in

257
00:14:27,960 --> 00:14:31,080
Speaker 1: the belly that you could take out in the womb. Yeah.

258
00:14:31,160 --> 00:14:34,240
Speaker 1: That it was. It's looked upon and Cracked Magazine as

259
00:14:34,320 --> 00:14:38,320
Speaker 1: one of the horrific toys in history. I think it

260
00:14:38,400 --> 00:14:41,640
Speaker 1: was necessary and educational, Alright. What was surprising to me

261
00:14:41,760 --> 00:14:43,960
Speaker 1: was that she was pregnant and it caused the second

262
00:14:43,960 --> 00:14:46,800
Speaker 1: time it caused waves as recently. It's like two thousand two,

263
00:14:47,400 --> 00:14:50,320
Speaker 1: two two or two thousand and six, it was fairly recent.

264
00:14:50,400 --> 00:14:54,240
Speaker 1: It seems the world still has hang ups about pregnancy

265
00:14:54,320 --> 00:14:57,240
Speaker 1: for some reason. Well, it's probably a single woman pregnancy,

266
00:14:57,360 --> 00:14:59,360
Speaker 1: probably not just the fact that she was pregnant. I

267
00:14:59,360 --> 00:15:02,720
Speaker 1: don't think any has he prompts pregnancy. Um, you've also

268
00:15:02,760 --> 00:15:06,680
Speaker 1: heard a skipper she uh was a sister she was

269
00:15:06,720 --> 00:15:10,320
Speaker 1: the little Sister's debuted in nineteen. Then there's Stacy, Todd

270
00:15:10,320 --> 00:15:15,080
Speaker 1: and Chelsea, who are named after the handler's grandchildren. Um,

271
00:15:15,160 --> 00:15:19,920
Speaker 1: and then about Ken, he's gone through some transitions over

272
00:15:19,920 --> 00:15:23,800
Speaker 1: the years. Is Malibu Kenna laid back dude, Magic Iran

273
00:15:23,880 --> 00:15:25,840
Speaker 1: Kin who will talk about a little more in death

274
00:15:26,880 --> 00:15:31,160
Speaker 1: shall we introduced in nineteen embraced by the gay community.

275
00:15:31,320 --> 00:15:34,840
Speaker 1: And um, have you seen pictures? Oh yeah, yeah, he's

276
00:15:34,840 --> 00:15:37,680
Speaker 1: got a do you not look up your earring? Magic Kin?

277
00:15:37,880 --> 00:15:41,080
Speaker 1: Not this personing? I did uh see through kind of

278
00:15:41,080 --> 00:15:46,360
Speaker 1: a sheer purple tank mesh mesh and uh there's a

279
00:15:46,400 --> 00:15:49,160
Speaker 1: matching purple jacket and a medallion. Doesn't he have like

280
00:15:49,200 --> 00:15:52,520
Speaker 1: a risk like corsage or something too? I didn't see

281
00:15:52,800 --> 00:15:56,680
Speaker 1: that part he looked like a gay raver. Yeah we

282
00:15:56,680 --> 00:15:59,000
Speaker 1: can say that. I mean, like dead on a gay raver.

283
00:15:59,120 --> 00:16:02,240
Speaker 1: I don't want to into any rabs out there. And

284
00:16:02,320 --> 00:16:07,000
Speaker 1: apparently the whole um this, the fact that the gay

285
00:16:07,040 --> 00:16:10,320
Speaker 1: community bought a large portion of these things, was a

286
00:16:10,320 --> 00:16:13,040
Speaker 1: big surprise to Mattel and they're like, wait, we didn't

287
00:16:13,040 --> 00:16:15,240
Speaker 1: mean that. So they took it off the shelves. Well,

288
00:16:15,400 --> 00:16:20,600
Speaker 1: they're pretty stupid, you know, registered trademark, registered trademark. They

289
00:16:20,600 --> 00:16:25,280
Speaker 1: were making big sales. Uh. There had long been joking

290
00:16:25,320 --> 00:16:29,760
Speaker 1: whispers about Kin's sexuality in pop culture, so when they

291
00:16:29,800 --> 00:16:32,480
Speaker 1: made this one, I think people thought, all right, they're

292
00:16:32,520 --> 00:16:35,360
Speaker 1: finally giving us like the real Kin. And then for

293
00:16:35,400 --> 00:16:37,960
Speaker 1: them to yanket back off the shelves, it's like come on, yeah,

294
00:16:38,040 --> 00:16:39,960
Speaker 1: Well that's the kind of a thread you'll see throughout

295
00:16:39,960 --> 00:16:44,920
Speaker 1: is that Mattel is very protective of Barbie's image and

296
00:16:45,200 --> 00:16:49,560
Speaker 1: by proxy Kin's image as well. Um, and apparently they

297
00:16:49,560 --> 00:16:53,480
Speaker 1: don't think Ken's gay. Um. Kenn and Barbie broke up once,

298
00:16:53,760 --> 00:16:56,600
Speaker 1: very famously in two thousand four. Yeah, and they got

299
00:16:56,640 --> 00:16:59,760
Speaker 1: well after blaming the Australian surfer showed up. They just

300
00:16:59,840 --> 00:17:03,080
Speaker 1: happened to break up then, but of course, like all

301
00:17:03,840 --> 00:17:07,640
Speaker 1: noted lovers in history, they got back together in Valentine's

302
00:17:07,640 --> 00:17:11,680
Speaker 1: on Valentine's State two thousand eleven. And apparently Barbie was

303
00:17:11,720 --> 00:17:13,840
Speaker 1: even on match dot com for a little while, and

304
00:17:13,960 --> 00:17:17,919
Speaker 1: Ken designed a cupcake for her at Magnolia Bakery and

305
00:17:17,960 --> 00:17:22,680
Speaker 1: posted billboards asking for Barbie's hand again and together. Of course,

306
00:17:22,800 --> 00:17:25,840
Speaker 1: she's never been married again. They got back together in

307
00:17:25,920 --> 00:17:29,639
Speaker 1: Valentine's State two thousand eleven. That's right. What about her jobs,

308
00:17:29,760 --> 00:17:33,480
Speaker 1: Barbie's a fact totem. She has done a lot of things.

309
00:17:33,560 --> 00:17:39,440
Speaker 1: Fashion model, astronaut, hundred and thirty careers totalners, been a cop,

310
00:17:39,560 --> 00:17:44,480
Speaker 1: a paleontologist. McDonald's franchise e was she franchise z? Because

311
00:17:44,520 --> 00:17:46,280
Speaker 1: I saw the one where she worked to the drive through?

312
00:17:46,600 --> 00:17:49,360
Speaker 1: It depends, Like if you really start thinking about Barbie,

313
00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:52,600
Speaker 1: she owned the place, Okay, but that's a big difference,

314
00:17:52,640 --> 00:17:54,840
Speaker 1: you know, of the image you're sending out, like is

315
00:17:54,840 --> 00:17:58,040
Speaker 1: she a business owner or she's slinging fries. Well, she's

316
00:17:58,080 --> 00:18:01,159
Speaker 1: also owned like tons of boutiques. Again, she owned that

317
00:18:01,200 --> 00:18:04,200
Speaker 1: hot dog sand like pretty much everything she works at

318
00:18:04,320 --> 00:18:07,040
Speaker 1: she's owned. I I that was the impression. I had

319
00:18:07,320 --> 00:18:11,600
Speaker 1: race car driver, aerobics instructor. She owned aerobics right while

320
00:18:11,640 --> 00:18:13,919
Speaker 1: she did it. She had a band, Barbie and the

321
00:18:14,000 --> 00:18:18,480
Speaker 1: Rockers that formed. That's right. I have not heard any songs,

322
00:18:18,520 --> 00:18:21,400
Speaker 1: but I should go look that up. And then animals,

323
00:18:21,600 --> 00:18:24,040
Speaker 1: she said, more than fifty pets, first of which was

324
00:18:24,080 --> 00:18:28,120
Speaker 1: a horse named Dancer. She said, twenty one dogs, twelve horses,

325
00:18:28,680 --> 00:18:32,359
Speaker 1: three ponies, six cats, a parrot, a champ papanda, a lion, cub,

326
00:18:32,800 --> 00:18:35,040
Speaker 1: a giraffe, and a zebra. And that is it for

327
00:18:35,080 --> 00:18:39,360
Speaker 1: the fake history of Barbie. Because, um, if there's one

328
00:18:39,400 --> 00:18:43,760
Speaker 1: thing about Barbie, it's that she collides with society, both

329
00:18:44,119 --> 00:18:47,359
Speaker 1: in academic circles and pop culture like you said, and

330
00:18:47,800 --> 00:18:52,639
Speaker 1: every aspect. Barbie has her her little plastic toes dipped

331
00:18:52,800 --> 00:18:56,720
Speaker 1: in some part of our society at large for tiny

332
00:18:56,720 --> 00:18:59,880
Speaker 1: little plastic does um. And probably the group that she's

333
00:19:00,040 --> 00:19:04,240
Speaker 1: run a foul of the most are feminists, right, Yeah,

334
00:19:04,320 --> 00:19:07,080
Speaker 1: and uh, this article makes a great point, like feminism

335
00:19:07,080 --> 00:19:10,919
Speaker 1: and Barberly Barbarie and Barbie co evolved right about the

336
00:19:10,920 --> 00:19:14,000
Speaker 1: same time in the nineteen early nineteen sixties, is when

337
00:19:14,040 --> 00:19:16,320
Speaker 1: these things were going on. Yeah, um, Barbie came out

338
00:19:16,359 --> 00:19:19,880
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty nine. Betty Friedan published The Feminist Mystique

339
00:19:19,880 --> 00:19:24,400
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty three. Right, so there they're just right there,

340
00:19:24,480 --> 00:19:29,440
Speaker 1: head to head, intertwined at each other's throats for pretty

341
00:19:29,520 --> 00:19:32,880
Speaker 1: much the whole time. Yeah, because, um, a feminist will

342
00:19:32,880 --> 00:19:36,800
Speaker 1: point out Barbie is, her figure is ridiculous, she's wealthy,

343
00:19:37,040 --> 00:19:41,679
Speaker 1: she's vapid, she's materialistic. Girls shouldn't even be playing with

344
00:19:41,720 --> 00:19:44,560
Speaker 1: this thing because it sends all the wrong messages, possibly

345
00:19:44,640 --> 00:19:50,040
Speaker 1: dangerous messages. Um. And there are times when Mattel's kind

346
00:19:50,080 --> 00:19:54,080
Speaker 1: of made the point for feminists or just any critic

347
00:19:54,119 --> 00:20:00,600
Speaker 1: of Barbie specifically ten Talk Barbie. Yeah, bad for them

348
00:20:00,640 --> 00:20:03,720
Speaker 1: sometimes with the stuff because they've made some terrible mistakes

349
00:20:03,720 --> 00:20:05,359
Speaker 1: a lot, I know, but you get I don't know.

350
00:20:05,560 --> 00:20:07,640
Speaker 1: You just picture like an out of touch board room

351
00:20:07,720 --> 00:20:09,840
Speaker 1: and they're trying to do the right thing and it

352
00:20:09,920 --> 00:20:12,919
Speaker 1: just blows up in their face over and over. So, uh,

353
00:20:13,600 --> 00:20:16,920
Speaker 1: Team Talk Barbie. Yeah, they recorded Uh this Barbie could

354
00:20:16,960 --> 00:20:20,640
Speaker 1: talk back to you thanks to a computer microchip, and

355
00:20:20,720 --> 00:20:22,920
Speaker 1: it would say four phrases, and they had two hundred

356
00:20:22,960 --> 00:20:26,479
Speaker 1: and seventy phrases total, and each doll got four at

357
00:20:26,560 --> 00:20:30,560
Speaker 1: random I love shopping, Let's have a pizza party, or

358
00:20:30,640 --> 00:20:33,640
Speaker 1: the one percent of dolls math class is tough, which

359
00:20:33,680 --> 00:20:36,080
Speaker 1: is a pretty high percentage for just one thing. So

360
00:20:36,240 --> 00:20:39,439
Speaker 1: like the worst thing that Team Talk Barbie could have

361
00:20:39,480 --> 00:20:43,760
Speaker 1: said ended up in the most dolls. Yeah. Uh and

362
00:20:43,840 --> 00:20:47,080
Speaker 1: of course, um that perpetuated the girls are bad at

363
00:20:47,080 --> 00:20:50,960
Speaker 1: math thing in the American Association of University Women said

364
00:20:51,200 --> 00:20:55,199
Speaker 1: we don't like perpetuating these stereotypes. Mattel said, fine, you

365
00:20:55,200 --> 00:20:57,879
Speaker 1: know what, We'll pull these and if you got one

366
00:20:57,920 --> 00:21:00,560
Speaker 1: of these, uh I don't like math doll, you can

367
00:21:00,600 --> 00:21:03,200
Speaker 1: send it in and get another one. But it was

368
00:21:03,280 --> 00:21:04,760
Speaker 1: kind of too late, and then the best thing in

369
00:21:04,840 --> 00:21:09,920
Speaker 1: history happened. Yeah, the Barbie Liberation Organization uh struck. They

370
00:21:10,040 --> 00:21:13,600
Speaker 1: bought hundreds of teen talk Barbies, and they also apparently

371
00:21:13,640 --> 00:21:16,600
Speaker 1: bought hundreds of talking Duke G I Joe action figures

372
00:21:16,880 --> 00:21:20,200
Speaker 1: and they switched the microchips out in them. So awesome,

373
00:21:20,359 --> 00:21:23,640
Speaker 1: and then they took them back. Uh. So, a lot

374
00:21:23,680 --> 00:21:26,840
Speaker 1: of little girls got barbies that said things like vengeance

375
00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:29,639
Speaker 1: is Mine and a lot of little boys got G I.

376
00:21:29,760 --> 00:21:32,040
Speaker 1: Joe's that said things like, let's plan our dream wedding.

377
00:21:32,640 --> 00:21:35,439
Speaker 1: That's pretty great. And there's actually a really excellent version

378
00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:38,520
Speaker 1: of this saga that's told in a Simpsons episode Lisa

379
00:21:38,600 --> 00:21:42,960
Speaker 1: versus Malibu. Stacey, Remember that got all this background based

380
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:47,280
Speaker 1: on Ruth Handler and Mattel Barbie and and this m

381
00:21:47,359 --> 00:21:50,440
Speaker 1: Barbie Liberation organization. I'm glad you mentioned that that I've

382
00:21:50,440 --> 00:21:52,680
Speaker 1: forgotten all about that. That's such a good Episode's a

383
00:21:52,680 --> 00:21:59,080
Speaker 1: good one, Lisa, lion heart. So, uh, Mattel and Um

384
00:21:59,160 --> 00:22:05,400
Speaker 1: and Ruth have always shot back or countered, maybe more politely.

385
00:22:05,600 --> 00:22:08,040
Speaker 1: They're not shrinking violence when you know the feminists are

386
00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:10,080
Speaker 1: on them. No, they say, you know what, Barbie was

387
00:22:10,119 --> 00:22:17,000
Speaker 1: created by women. Barbie has always had you know, jobs

388
00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:20,240
Speaker 1: sometimes male traditional male jobs. Yeah, they say, she she

389
00:22:20,240 --> 00:22:24,040
Speaker 1: she breaks the plastic ceiling. Yeah, like she was day night,

390
00:22:24,119 --> 00:22:29,879
Speaker 1: day to night CEO Barbie, UM, Barbie for President, astronaut

391
00:22:29,880 --> 00:22:33,640
Speaker 1: Barbie UM. And they basically said, you know what, she's

392
00:22:33,680 --> 00:22:38,720
Speaker 1: never been married, she never had kids. Barbie is a feminist, right,

393
00:22:39,200 --> 00:22:41,400
Speaker 1: although I bet a lot of feminists would argue back,

394
00:22:41,400 --> 00:22:43,160
Speaker 1: and they have been for years. Well yeah, but some

395
00:22:43,240 --> 00:22:47,720
Speaker 1: feminists also actually grudgingly support Barbie as a champion of

396
00:22:47,760 --> 00:22:50,480
Speaker 1: women's right. So there's this one article I read by

397
00:22:50,480 --> 00:22:54,840
Speaker 1: by Deb Moore Hennicky. It's called rethinking Barbie. And she

398
00:22:54,920 --> 00:22:57,760
Speaker 1: points out that quote Kendall's come in several outfits, but

399
00:22:57,920 --> 00:22:59,920
Speaker 1: really he's just there. If Barbie happens to want to

400
00:23:00,000 --> 00:23:02,399
Speaker 1: go on a date, she does not stand around waiting

401
00:23:02,400 --> 00:23:04,840
Speaker 1: for Ken to show up, or she needs someone to

402
00:23:04,880 --> 00:23:06,920
Speaker 1: go shopping with her to help her pick up friends

403
00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:09,080
Speaker 1: for that, And the next sentence she basically said, like

404
00:23:09,119 --> 00:23:11,520
Speaker 1: she goes shopping with her friends, she basically does whatever

405
00:23:11,600 --> 00:23:14,520
Speaker 1: she wants, you know. Um, so she's no, she's no

406
00:23:14,680 --> 00:23:18,119
Speaker 1: lackey for Ken. And they'll also point out that, you

407
00:23:18,119 --> 00:23:21,520
Speaker 1: know what, before we came along, it was just like

408
00:23:21,640 --> 00:23:24,720
Speaker 1: baby dolls, and all it said was here you can

409
00:23:24,760 --> 00:23:28,040
Speaker 1: only be a mother to a child or have a

410
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:31,280
Speaker 1: little imaginary best friend, little girl doll. There were no

411
00:23:31,359 --> 00:23:34,520
Speaker 1: adult dolls that had adult jobs and thinking like adult jobs.

412
00:23:34,560 --> 00:23:37,440
Speaker 1: But know yeah, and even from the outset me um,

413
00:23:37,520 --> 00:23:41,080
Speaker 1: Ruth Handler created Barbie with the idea that little girls

414
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:46,440
Speaker 1: could use this older doll to imagine themselves in their

415
00:23:46,520 --> 00:23:51,560
Speaker 1: life and maybe hopefully make a better path for themselves. Um,

416
00:23:51,600 --> 00:23:54,040
Speaker 1: and that's kind of been a point of Barbie all along.

417
00:23:54,080 --> 00:23:56,600
Speaker 1: And there's actually There's this one study out of Washington

418
00:23:56,640 --> 00:23:59,760
Speaker 1: and Lee in two thousand ten that supported that that

419
00:24:00,000 --> 00:24:02,400
Speaker 1: down that when the groups of little girls were showing

420
00:24:02,400 --> 00:24:07,639
Speaker 1: a Barbie doll getting into, um, the outfit of like

421
00:24:07,680 --> 00:24:13,160
Speaker 1: a male dominated occupation, like firefighter, they tended to report

422
00:24:13,359 --> 00:24:16,000
Speaker 1: that they could grow up to be a firefighter too. So,

423
00:24:16,040 --> 00:24:19,240
Speaker 1: I mean there is support for that very much. Um.

424
00:24:19,359 --> 00:24:23,240
Speaker 1: But still there's a lot of easy shots that one

425
00:24:23,280 --> 00:24:28,000
Speaker 1: can take a Mattel is, you know, basically making Barbie

426
00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:32,760
Speaker 1: a sexualized doll. Yeah, but I mean since the very

427
00:24:32,760 --> 00:24:36,480
Speaker 1: beginning until yesterday, this has been going on, and it's

428
00:24:36,520 --> 00:24:39,040
Speaker 1: just one of those lifelong battles. Mattel is never gonna

429
00:24:39,080 --> 00:24:43,760
Speaker 1: back down, and I'm sure the feminist probably won't either.

430
00:24:44,600 --> 00:24:48,040
Speaker 1: Studies aside, everyone has their opinion on Barbie. Yeah, And

431
00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:50,440
Speaker 1: I think that's a really good point about Barbie. I

432
00:24:50,480 --> 00:24:56,240
Speaker 1: feel like she is a giant mirror for society, everything

433
00:24:56,280 --> 00:24:58,240
Speaker 1: that's wrong with it, everything that's right with it it

434
00:24:58,320 --> 00:25:00,679
Speaker 1: depending on how you look at Barbie, and on a

435
00:25:00,760 --> 00:25:03,960
Speaker 1: much more micro cosmic level, depending on how an individual

436
00:25:04,000 --> 00:25:08,239
Speaker 1: little girl plays with Barbie, she can be a you know,

437
00:25:08,280 --> 00:25:12,119
Speaker 1: a tool for aspiration or something that teaches the girl

438
00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:15,480
Speaker 1: all the wrong things. That's good point. Yeah, all right,

439
00:25:15,560 --> 00:25:19,600
Speaker 1: So we should talk about Barbie and race because Mattel

440
00:25:19,680 --> 00:25:23,040
Speaker 1: has also like made some missteps over the years when

441
00:25:23,080 --> 00:25:28,000
Speaker 1: it comes to the cringe yeah, cringe worthy episode coming up. Uh.

442
00:25:28,040 --> 00:25:31,879
Speaker 1: In ninety seven, they conceived of a black friend for

443
00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:39,000
Speaker 1: Barbie and they called her colored Francie. I know, Um,

444
00:25:39,040 --> 00:25:41,080
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how well that went over. It's hard

445
00:25:41,200 --> 00:25:43,680
Speaker 1: to tell now because it sounds so ridiculous, but I

446
00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:45,080
Speaker 1: don't know how it was received at the time. I

447
00:25:45,080 --> 00:25:49,440
Speaker 1: couldn't find anything on that. Um, apparently not that great

448
00:25:49,480 --> 00:25:52,919
Speaker 1: because Colored francis not around any longer. Well, their follow

449
00:25:52,960 --> 00:25:56,160
Speaker 1: up wasn't that much better. In eight they came out

450
00:25:56,200 --> 00:26:00,520
Speaker 1: with Black Barbie. That's what they called it. Yep, Black Barbie.

451
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:04,200
Speaker 1: Black Barbie. Ken came out two years later African American

452
00:26:04,280 --> 00:26:08,760
Speaker 1: Ken sun Stational Malibuchan in was was was black and

453
00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:12,920
Speaker 1: Um the problem was until two thousand nine, until three

454
00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:16,520
Speaker 1: years ago. One of the problems, one of the problems,

455
00:26:16,600 --> 00:26:20,159
Speaker 1: aside from the naming conventions, uh, is that they still

456
00:26:20,280 --> 00:26:23,639
Speaker 1: use the quote unquote white dolls and just made the

457
00:26:23,640 --> 00:26:27,400
Speaker 1: skin tone darker. Yeah, and they they didn't change any

458
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:30,160
Speaker 1: other aspect of the doll until three years ago when

459
00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:35,800
Speaker 1: they finally, um made African American barbies Kara, Grace and Trichelle,

460
00:26:36,320 --> 00:26:41,000
Speaker 1: and they had designs apparently to replicate features of real

461
00:26:41,040 --> 00:26:44,160
Speaker 1: African American women. Finally, and have you seen these dolls

462
00:26:44,440 --> 00:26:46,600
Speaker 1: I have? Yeah, they're great. One of them looks sort

463
00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:50,359
Speaker 1: of like Beyonce. Um that one that two thousand and

464
00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:54,040
Speaker 1: ten Washington Least study that we mentioned. That author also

465
00:26:54,119 --> 00:26:58,400
Speaker 1: started to wonder like, how does what Barbie doesn't? How

466
00:26:58,440 --> 00:27:02,640
Speaker 1: does what Barbie isn't doing? A acting little girls as well? Yeah,

467
00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:05,960
Speaker 1: so the point she made was, Um, if a young

468
00:27:06,000 --> 00:27:09,920
Speaker 1: African American girl goes into a store and um, like,

469
00:27:10,160 --> 00:27:14,119
Speaker 1: there's not a black president Barbie, right, what does that

470
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:18,760
Speaker 1: tell her? Sure, there's just the white president Barbie. That's

471
00:27:18,760 --> 00:27:23,480
Speaker 1: a good point. Um Again, prepare for cringing, because, like

472
00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:26,879
Speaker 1: you said, apparently Mattel's boardroom exists in a in a

473
00:27:26,960 --> 00:27:31,520
Speaker 1: cultural vacuum. So uh in they got a ring and

474
00:27:31,600 --> 00:27:34,240
Speaker 1: ding from Nabisco who said, hey, we need to move

475
00:27:34,280 --> 00:27:36,719
Speaker 1: some Oreos, so why don't you guys make an Oreo

476
00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:39,560
Speaker 1: theme Barbie? And they said, sure. Problem we should point

477
00:27:39,600 --> 00:27:42,640
Speaker 1: out they've done a lot of deals with companies over

478
00:27:42,680 --> 00:27:46,359
Speaker 1: the years. Yeah, so this wasn't anything bigger, Newer cook Barbie,

479
00:27:46,359 --> 00:27:49,679
Speaker 1: Pepsi Barbie, Nascar Barbie. It seems like anytime they have

480
00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:51,720
Speaker 1: a new you know, I mean I have a Barbie.

481
00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:55,680
Speaker 1: Do you really know Josh Barbie? Oh I thought you

482
00:27:55,680 --> 00:27:57,280
Speaker 1: meant you owned one. No, no, no, there's a yeah,

483
00:27:57,320 --> 00:28:00,640
Speaker 1: there's a podcaster Barbie. Yeah. Um. So they they contracted

484
00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:02,880
Speaker 1: with Nibisco and they came out with an Oreo theme

485
00:28:02,920 --> 00:28:05,280
Speaker 1: Barbie and all was fine. They got a few complaints

486
00:28:05,320 --> 00:28:08,520
Speaker 1: saying like this promotes junk food, but nothing big, no,

487
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:11,920
Speaker 1: big East, the usual stuff. And then they released a

488
00:28:11,960 --> 00:28:16,480
Speaker 1: black version of Oreo Barbie. Yes, and that costs some

489
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:20,320
Speaker 1: controversy because, like you said, apparently their boardroom is in

490
00:28:20,400 --> 00:28:23,679
Speaker 1: a vacuum and they did not realize that, Uh, that

491
00:28:23,840 --> 00:28:28,520
Speaker 1: is a racial epithet, uh level leveled by black people

492
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:30,800
Speaker 1: against other black people who they feel like are being

493
00:28:30,840 --> 00:28:33,920
Speaker 1: too quote unquote white. So there dark on the outside,

494
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:37,680
Speaker 1: white in the middle Oreos and Mattel wasn't aware of this.

495
00:28:38,320 --> 00:28:42,200
Speaker 1: And they released an African American Barbie that said Oreo

496
00:28:42,280 --> 00:28:45,280
Speaker 1: all over on the shirt and like in the purse,

497
00:28:45,400 --> 00:28:48,160
Speaker 1: and uh, they are now a collector's item, of course,

498
00:28:48,160 --> 00:28:51,320
Speaker 1: because they quickly were yanked from the shelves and his

499
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 1: cracked dot com put it. They quote picked the one

500
00:28:54,360 --> 00:28:57,640
Speaker 1: cookie in the universe that could ever be considered as offensive. Ever,

501
00:28:59,680 --> 00:29:01,760
Speaker 1: the one cookie she could have been the Nutter Butter

502
00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:06,000
Speaker 1: barbie problem. Yeah, you're right, or corrects right? Um so

503
00:29:06,160 --> 00:29:10,080
Speaker 1: Mattel Also as there's a lot of stuff that they do, right,

504
00:29:10,160 --> 00:29:12,880
Speaker 1: Like in that case, they didn't mean to offend anybody.

505
00:29:12,880 --> 00:29:15,959
Speaker 1: It was just a horrible mistake. Um. And you know,

506
00:29:16,040 --> 00:29:18,960
Speaker 1: they released an African American barbie and they released a

507
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:22,200
Speaker 1: white barbie. Right. Um. They do the same with with

508
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 1: multi ethnic barbies from around the world. They've been releasing

509
00:29:25,840 --> 00:29:28,600
Speaker 1: them forever. And like it's great because you know, oh,

510
00:29:28,680 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: there's a place called Spain. A little girl says, like

511
00:29:32,040 --> 00:29:33,719
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. It's good for that. But at

512
00:29:33,760 --> 00:29:37,800
Speaker 1: the same time, it's like the clothes they dressed them

513
00:29:37,880 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 1: up in are beyond stereotypical. Like Native American barbie, the

514
00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:45,360
Speaker 1: Dutch barbie looks like the Swiss miss Girl. Um. As

515
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:48,800
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, it probably is. Um. And then

516
00:29:48,920 --> 00:29:53,000
Speaker 1: Vitan Ken from Mexico in nine four. He's wearing a sombrero.

517
00:29:54,280 --> 00:29:58,480
Speaker 1: It's just agonizing. Sometimes they're trying to just miss the

518
00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:00,560
Speaker 1: mark once in a while. Yeah, I get the feeling

519
00:30:00,640 --> 00:30:02,800
Speaker 1: that the boardroom is not only in a vacuum, but

520
00:30:02,880 --> 00:30:06,240
Speaker 1: it's a lot of like old white people making these decisions.

521
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:12,360
Speaker 1: Um okay. So I would say probably the most controversial

522
00:30:12,360 --> 00:30:16,000
Speaker 1: aspect of Barbie always from the outset, before she was

523
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:19,400
Speaker 1: even created, because her body. Yeah, that's what kept her

524
00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:21,320
Speaker 1: from being created in the first place. As we mentioned,

525
00:30:21,320 --> 00:30:25,680
Speaker 1: the uh Mattel CEO said, you can't release at all

526
00:30:25,760 --> 00:30:30,440
Speaker 1: with big breast. I'm glad you finally got that out.

527
00:30:30,600 --> 00:30:32,320
Speaker 1: Just like didn't even know how to say that, but

528
00:30:32,360 --> 00:30:35,560
Speaker 1: that's what they said. And since then, Barbie's figure has

529
00:30:35,600 --> 00:30:42,080
Speaker 1: been notoriously called out is unsupportable, fake, um, not realistic,

530
00:30:42,760 --> 00:30:47,200
Speaker 1: and at worst, like really bad for these little girls

531
00:30:47,200 --> 00:30:49,600
Speaker 1: in their body image and what they think they're supposed

532
00:30:49,640 --> 00:30:53,160
Speaker 1: to look like, like a tool of body dysmorphic disorder. Basically,

533
00:30:53,240 --> 00:30:55,080
Speaker 1: it's like it's not even possible to look that way,

534
00:30:55,920 --> 00:30:59,800
Speaker 1: they say it depending okay. So what's very interesting, I think, Chuck,

535
00:30:59,880 --> 00:31:04,160
Speaker 1: is that this design of her body was actually a

536
00:31:04,200 --> 00:31:08,200
Speaker 1: design decision made by her designers, who were all women,

537
00:31:08,920 --> 00:31:12,480
Speaker 1: career women's successful career women um to allow her to

538
00:31:12,560 --> 00:31:16,719
Speaker 1: wear miniature versions of real like fashion clothes, so like

539
00:31:16,800 --> 00:31:20,040
Speaker 1: her crazy hips and small waist, they were designed like

540
00:31:20,080 --> 00:31:22,800
Speaker 1: that so that she could she could wear these clothes

541
00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:26,160
Speaker 1: that gathered at the waist and she had breasts, so

542
00:31:26,240 --> 00:31:28,880
Speaker 1: she could wear these biouses or whatever that we're like

543
00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:31,560
Speaker 1: based on real clothes and designed by real designers. So

544
00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:34,560
Speaker 1: it's actually a design decision, but it quickly took on

545
00:31:34,640 --> 00:31:38,040
Speaker 1: its life that like, yeah, Barbies, this evil tool that

546
00:31:38,160 --> 00:31:42,520
Speaker 1: spreads this um unhealthy body image to little girls. Yeah.

547
00:31:42,560 --> 00:31:44,640
Speaker 1: I think it was the nine fifties and it was

548
00:31:44,680 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 1: just like, you know, let's make a full figure and

549
00:31:47,520 --> 00:31:50,400
Speaker 1: you know, a tiny waist and girls will love it

550
00:31:50,560 --> 00:31:54,360
Speaker 1: or she looks like us? Yeah what what? This is

551
00:31:54,400 --> 00:31:58,640
Speaker 1: just my personal opinion here. That's all well and good.

552
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:01,560
Speaker 1: Since then, may be, since they've taken all these steps

553
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:04,960
Speaker 1: to introduce more correct versions, maybe they should release a

554
00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:10,120
Speaker 1: like realistic Barbie dump Be Barbie, a k. A normal

555
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:12,840
Speaker 1: looking person Barbie. I don't think it will ever happen.

556
00:32:12,960 --> 00:32:15,560
Speaker 1: I don't think they have made changes to her figure,

557
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:18,960
Speaker 1: so she's nothing like she was when she first came out.

558
00:32:19,400 --> 00:32:21,960
Speaker 1: She's not like she was. She she has changed some,

559
00:32:22,680 --> 00:32:25,680
Speaker 1: but for the most part there there's not gonna be

560
00:32:25,720 --> 00:32:29,160
Speaker 1: a dumpy Barbie, not if you call it that. See,

561
00:32:29,160 --> 00:32:32,880
Speaker 1: that's part of the problem is looking average you called dumpy.

562
00:32:32,920 --> 00:32:35,520
Speaker 1: Oh come on, man, I am definitely not part of

563
00:32:35,560 --> 00:32:38,440
Speaker 1: the problem. I don't. I wouldn't call it a normal

564
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:41,400
Speaker 1: looking person dumpy Barbie. Then compared to Barbie, you would

565
00:32:41,400 --> 00:32:44,720
Speaker 1: call her dumpy Barbie. I think that's definitely that's the

566
00:32:44,760 --> 00:32:48,640
Speaker 1: whole zeitgeist behind this whole thing. Like if if Barbie

567
00:32:48,720 --> 00:32:53,080
Speaker 1: is perfect than anything else, that's different as dumpy. Alright,

568
00:32:53,120 --> 00:32:57,920
Speaker 1: well I disagree, Um well, National Organization of Women would

569
00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:01,520
Speaker 1: probably disagree to. They've frequently saw. Did Barbie is a

570
00:33:01,520 --> 00:33:06,520
Speaker 1: again this instrument of delivering an unhealthy body image to

571
00:33:06,600 --> 00:33:09,640
Speaker 1: little girls? Yeah? And like you said, they sometimes they

572
00:33:09,640 --> 00:33:12,000
Speaker 1: don't make it any easier on themselves because in the

573
00:33:12,040 --> 00:33:15,920
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty three Barbie sit upset, there was a pamphlet

574
00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:18,240
Speaker 1: called how to Lose Weight, and one of the tips

575
00:33:18,240 --> 00:33:26,239
Speaker 1: Barbie says, don't eat and that's it. So they Two

576
00:33:26,320 --> 00:33:28,960
Speaker 1: years later there was another booklet, Barbie Slumber Party, that

577
00:33:29,040 --> 00:33:31,880
Speaker 1: said there was a bathroom scale that was permanently set

578
00:33:31,920 --> 00:33:34,120
Speaker 1: at a hundred and ten pounds, and that sounds like

579
00:33:34,160 --> 00:33:36,840
Speaker 1: that's a little weird. The same booklet was included, Yeah,

580
00:33:36,920 --> 00:33:39,120
Speaker 1: oh yeah, it's weird. And even if it's not weird,

581
00:33:39,400 --> 00:33:42,320
Speaker 1: and again like if you take this, the conventional idea

582
00:33:42,360 --> 00:33:45,720
Speaker 1: of what's going with the thought is behind this um

583
00:33:46,480 --> 00:33:50,320
Speaker 1: you they said, okay, well what is Barbie? Wait? Barbie

584
00:33:50,360 --> 00:33:53,600
Speaker 1: is well, we can't make a real um scale that

585
00:33:53,640 --> 00:33:56,160
Speaker 1: moves back and forth, so we're gonna set it at

586
00:33:56,200 --> 00:33:59,520
Speaker 1: one ten without any thought that possibly this little girl

587
00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:01,400
Speaker 1: is gonna think that if she doesn't weigh a hundred

588
00:34:01,440 --> 00:34:04,080
Speaker 1: and ten, like, she's not as pretty as Barbie. Yes,

589
00:34:04,120 --> 00:34:06,560
Speaker 1: it never will be, and it will always hate herself

590
00:34:06,640 --> 00:34:09,520
Speaker 1: for not weighing a hundred and ten pounds. It's just

591
00:34:09,640 --> 00:34:13,880
Speaker 1: these decisions made without this wider thought has kind of

592
00:34:13,880 --> 00:34:17,200
Speaker 1: give him a Telli's reputation. That's right. They've done studies

593
00:34:17,239 --> 00:34:19,960
Speaker 1: on this. They did one in two thousand eleven in Holland,

594
00:34:20,520 --> 00:34:22,800
Speaker 1: and they said that girls who played with average sized

595
00:34:22,800 --> 00:34:26,799
Speaker 1: dollars for ten minutes eight significantly more during a taste

596
00:34:26,800 --> 00:34:28,840
Speaker 1: test following play than girls who played with the Barbie

597
00:34:28,840 --> 00:34:33,399
Speaker 1: dolls or a thin doll like Barbie. Yeah, to be fair,

598
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:37,799
Speaker 1: And another study which I thought was pretty interesting. Well,

599
00:34:37,840 --> 00:34:41,440
Speaker 1: obviously they found that promotes materialism and sexualizes play. But um,

600
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:44,960
Speaker 1: this other study found that there's more torture play and

601
00:34:45,040 --> 00:34:47,839
Speaker 1: anger play involved with Barbie, Like a little girl will

602
00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:50,960
Speaker 1: rip off Barbie's arms or head, and they found that

603
00:34:51,000 --> 00:34:55,680
Speaker 1: they ripped off more Barbie parts than other dolls because,

604
00:34:55,719 --> 00:34:57,680
Speaker 1: as one girl said, quote, she's the only one that

605
00:34:57,719 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 1: looks perfect. Right. So this is huge, huge, massive body

606
00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:06,560
Speaker 1: of work on the effect that Barbie's body has on

607
00:35:06,680 --> 00:35:08,520
Speaker 1: the little girls that play with there, and more often

608
00:35:08,520 --> 00:35:14,080
Speaker 1: than not, they find that it creates a poor self

609
00:35:14,120 --> 00:35:17,960
Speaker 1: image body image in little girls. But interestingly, it tends

610
00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:22,760
Speaker 1: to disappear in tweens. Yeah, like, um, say they're studying

611
00:35:22,760 --> 00:35:26,280
Speaker 1: girls three to ten, it'll really appear in like three, four, five, six,

612
00:35:26,680 --> 00:35:30,239
Speaker 1: But then like like it doesn't appear as much. It's

613
00:35:30,280 --> 00:35:34,759
Speaker 1: not as prevalent. Interesting, Yeah, it is, but you you wonder, like,

614
00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:38,239
Speaker 1: what's the lasting effect of those when it hits those three, four,

615
00:35:38,320 --> 00:35:40,120
Speaker 1: five and six year old you know, yeah, that's true

616
00:35:40,200 --> 00:35:43,440
Speaker 1: formative years. Um. There's also been a lot of studies

617
00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:46,080
Speaker 1: and reports of what Barbie would look like worsh a

618
00:35:46,120 --> 00:35:49,839
Speaker 1: real person, right, Yeah, they're always disturbing. So you said that, like,

619
00:35:49,880 --> 00:35:54,800
Speaker 1: it's impossible look like Barbie. Not entirely, but close. South

620
00:35:54,920 --> 00:36:00,000
Speaker 1: Australia University researchers calculated that a woman's chance of natural

621
00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:02,880
Speaker 1: really having Barbie's figure was one in a hundred thousand.

622
00:36:03,480 --> 00:36:05,720
Speaker 1: I'm surprised it's not more than that. I am too,

623
00:36:06,160 --> 00:36:08,520
Speaker 1: But for a man to have Ken's figure, you have

624
00:36:08,560 --> 00:36:11,960
Speaker 1: like a one in fifty chance. You and I are

625
00:36:11,840 --> 00:36:17,080
Speaker 1: are we don't have good chances. Uh. And in Finland

626
00:36:17,120 --> 00:36:21,360
Speaker 1: at their University Central Hospital, they say Barbie were life size,

627
00:36:21,920 --> 00:36:24,960
Speaker 1: she would lack the seventeen to two percent body fat

628
00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:28,799
Speaker 1: required for a woman to menstrate, so she's so thin

629
00:36:28,960 --> 00:36:34,719
Speaker 1: she medically can't even menstrate. And the BBC did this

630
00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:39,320
Speaker 1: comparison of Barbie and one of their employees named Libby,

631
00:36:39,440 --> 00:36:42,000
Speaker 1: and if Libby were to keep her twenty eight inch

632
00:36:42,040 --> 00:36:45,520
Speaker 1: waist but stay in step with Barbie's other proportions, she

633
00:36:45,560 --> 00:36:48,239
Speaker 1: would have to be seven ft six inches tall, which

634
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:51,280
Speaker 1: again isn't impossible. The world's tallest woman is Yeow Defend,

635
00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:54,279
Speaker 1: who's seven ft eight inches tall. Yeah, but she didn't

636
00:36:54,280 --> 00:36:57,719
Speaker 1: look like Barbie. Uh, and then if she kept her height,

637
00:36:57,760 --> 00:37:01,840
Speaker 1: if Libby kept her hype but shrank Barbie's proportioned waist,

638
00:37:02,320 --> 00:37:04,759
Speaker 1: she would have a twenty inch waist, which is three

639
00:37:04,800 --> 00:37:11,200
Speaker 1: inches smaller in circumference than um Victoria Beckham's waist. Who's

640
00:37:11,239 --> 00:37:14,239
Speaker 1: like a bean pole beyond the beam posts. She's gotta

641
00:37:14,280 --> 00:37:20,520
Speaker 1: be like one of the She's like Vampira waistwise, she's thin. Um.

642
00:37:20,560 --> 00:37:24,680
Speaker 1: And did you see this Ukrainian woman? She says she

643
00:37:24,760 --> 00:37:29,400
Speaker 1: hasn't had plastic surgery. She's not being truthful. Valeria Valeria

644
00:37:29,640 --> 00:37:33,520
Speaker 1: Um Lucan Lucia Nova. Yeah, the quote unquote real life

645
00:37:33,560 --> 00:37:37,760
Speaker 1: Barbie doll. She's a model, artist and singer supposedly, and uh,

646
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:39,800
Speaker 1: just look up a picture of her and prepare to

647
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:42,719
Speaker 1: get creeped out. She's very animate. Have you seen her friend,

648
00:37:42,760 --> 00:37:46,480
Speaker 1: that's like the real life anime girl. Yeah, she photoshop

649
00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:49,760
Speaker 1: se she denies it, but I saw untouched before pictures

650
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:53,040
Speaker 1: and she's clearly had plastic surgery and she doctors her photos.

651
00:37:53,640 --> 00:37:56,960
Speaker 1: But um, it's creepy. She looks like a doll. She

652
00:37:57,000 --> 00:37:59,680
Speaker 1: doesn't look real, she doesn't look alive. She's in the

653
00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:03,640
Speaker 1: young Annie Valley. But she's a real person. Yeah. Um,

654
00:38:03,760 --> 00:38:07,240
Speaker 1: there's a woman named Cindy Jackson who's a brit who

655
00:38:07,280 --> 00:38:11,120
Speaker 1: actually holds the record for um most plastic surgeries in

656
00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:14,640
Speaker 1: a lifetime fifty two as of April two eleven. And

657
00:38:14,760 --> 00:38:18,560
Speaker 1: she started undergoing those at age one after deciding that

658
00:38:18,600 --> 00:38:20,640
Speaker 1: she wanted to look like Barbie back when she was six.

659
00:38:21,360 --> 00:38:23,760
Speaker 1: So she moved to London and started going under the knife.

660
00:38:23,840 --> 00:38:26,439
Speaker 1: I didn't see a picture of her to you. Oh yeah,

661
00:38:26,520 --> 00:38:29,680
Speaker 1: well she looks like she looks Barbie. Yeah. So we

662
00:38:29,760 --> 00:38:33,080
Speaker 1: mentioned the litigious nature of Mattel guarding zealous league guarding

663
00:38:33,440 --> 00:38:38,319
Speaker 1: Barbie's image over the years. Uh, and you have dug

664
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:43,520
Speaker 1: up via the Bathroom Reader and notable examples. Um number one.

665
00:38:43,560 --> 00:38:47,360
Speaker 1: Paul Hanson in the n H San Francisco artists began

666
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:52,360
Speaker 1: selling Barbie art basically drag Queen Barbie, Tanya Harding Barbie,

667
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:55,240
Speaker 1: Exorcist Barbie having a lot of fun with it, Tanya

668
00:38:55,280 --> 00:38:57,920
Speaker 1: Hardening Barbie. I guess it comes with a little minicro

669
00:38:58,040 --> 00:39:03,840
Speaker 1: bar there's dumpy Barbie right there. Oh boy. Um. He

670
00:39:03,920 --> 00:39:06,320
Speaker 1: sold about a hundred and fifty dollars, earned about two grand,

671
00:39:06,920 --> 00:39:10,000
Speaker 1: and Mattel sued him for one point two billion dollars.

672
00:39:10,880 --> 00:39:13,040
Speaker 1: This is what these corporations can do. They'll just be like,

673
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:18,719
Speaker 1: I didn't gonna sue you for nine dollars. So Hansen

674
00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:21,160
Speaker 1: is like, alright, alright, alright, everybody just calmed down. How

675
00:39:21,200 --> 00:39:24,759
Speaker 1: about this. I will sell my dolls only in art galleries,

676
00:39:24,880 --> 00:39:28,919
Speaker 1: no more stores, just the galleries themselves, and I will

677
00:39:29,200 --> 00:39:32,319
Speaker 1: donate all of the profits charity. Mattel said, no, We're

678
00:39:32,360 --> 00:39:35,080
Speaker 1: going to court. Pal. So they went to court, and

679
00:39:35,080 --> 00:39:39,880
Speaker 1: eventually a judge, uh just lost patients, it said, and

680
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:43,600
Speaker 1: granted a partial judgment and said against Mattel for not

681
00:39:43,680 --> 00:39:46,160
Speaker 1: having a sense of humor. So a little smack on

682
00:39:46,200 --> 00:39:49,160
Speaker 1: the face, but I'm sure the attorneys smugly left with

683
00:39:49,239 --> 00:39:53,239
Speaker 1: their headheld high. Um. And that's kind of similar to

684
00:39:53,320 --> 00:39:58,239
Speaker 1: another artist's case, Mark Napier, who's uh from New York.

685
00:39:58,239 --> 00:40:01,359
Speaker 1: He's got us a website. UM that was originally called

686
00:40:01,360 --> 00:40:04,440
Speaker 1: the Distorted Barbie website. UM, and it was pictures of

687
00:40:04,560 --> 00:40:08,480
Speaker 1: Kate Moss, Barbie Fat and ugly Barbie Dolly parton Barbie. UM,

688
00:40:08,480 --> 00:40:11,359
Speaker 1: and Mattel sent a ceason desist later apparently they were

689
00:40:11,400 --> 00:40:14,080
Speaker 1: a fan of this guy or something. UM. Imagine that

690
00:40:14,200 --> 00:40:17,080
Speaker 1: people trolling the world for this kind of stuff, you know.

691
00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:19,160
Speaker 1: I mean they sent a ceason assist rather than suing

692
00:40:19,239 --> 00:40:21,920
Speaker 1: him for a billion dollars in days, instead of just

693
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:24,359
Speaker 1: suing him. But Napier said, you know what, I'm not

694
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:26,719
Speaker 1: going to really do this, h percent. I'm gonna blur

695
00:40:26,840 --> 00:40:28,719
Speaker 1: the images a little bit and then change the B

696
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:32,000
Speaker 1: and Barbie to a dollar sign. I wonder if it's

697
00:40:32,000 --> 00:40:34,319
Speaker 1: still up. I haven't looked. I haven't looked either. And

698
00:40:34,360 --> 00:40:38,879
Speaker 1: then there's Barbie. Barbie Bell a k. Barbara Bell. Yeah,

699
00:40:39,040 --> 00:40:41,560
Speaker 1: this one is a little she's at wacky. She claimed

700
00:40:41,600 --> 00:40:44,200
Speaker 1: that Barbie was speaking to her. Is that right? And

701
00:40:44,200 --> 00:40:49,040
Speaker 1: and started selling uh chances to channel Barbie spirit and

702
00:40:49,120 --> 00:40:52,720
Speaker 1: answer personal questions via Barbie for three bucks three bucks

703
00:40:52,719 --> 00:40:57,120
Speaker 1: a pop. Barbie will directly through me tell you whatever

704
00:40:57,160 --> 00:41:00,200
Speaker 1: you want to know. Well, and um, Barbie sent her

705
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:04,480
Speaker 1: first message to Barbara Bell. The message was I need respect.

706
00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:09,319
Speaker 1: So Bell also, this is probably what pushed her over

707
00:41:09,360 --> 00:41:11,320
Speaker 1: the edge as far as Mattel is concerned. She started

708
00:41:11,320 --> 00:41:14,719
Speaker 1: publishing the Barbie Channeling newsletter. So I'm Antell threatened a

709
00:41:14,800 --> 00:41:19,000
Speaker 1: multimillion dollar lawsuit. Bell is like, okay, fine, that's fine.

710
00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:22,200
Speaker 1: I'll shut down, but first I'm gonna make a statement. Look,

711
00:41:22,400 --> 00:41:25,560
Speaker 1: she says, for three dollars, nobody's getting hurt. I don't

712
00:41:25,600 --> 00:41:27,719
Speaker 1: claim to be the only voice of Barbie. And I'm

713
00:41:27,760 --> 00:41:30,799
Speaker 1: sure not taking any other channeler's business. I've carved out

714
00:41:30,840 --> 00:41:33,560
Speaker 1: my own niche in the market. There's seven million Barbie

715
00:41:33,600 --> 00:41:37,600
Speaker 1: dolls in the world with no voice my favorite partist.

716
00:41:37,640 --> 00:41:41,080
Speaker 1: I'm sure not taking any other channeler's business. Nobody else

717
00:41:41,120 --> 00:41:45,000
Speaker 1: would be this crazy, is what she's saying. Um, this

718
00:41:45,040 --> 00:41:47,960
Speaker 1: one turned out a little odd if you ask me. Um.

719
00:41:49,080 --> 00:41:51,799
Speaker 1: There's a band called Aqua from Denmark. They recorded a

720
00:41:51,840 --> 00:41:54,680
Speaker 1: song called Barbie Girl. You know this song? Right? Oh?

721
00:41:54,719 --> 00:42:11,359
Speaker 1: Here it is now do you recognize it? Yes, you do.

722
00:42:12,280 --> 00:42:15,760
Speaker 1: I'm a Barbie girl in a Barbie world. Is plastic.

723
00:42:15,800 --> 00:42:18,920
Speaker 1: It's fantastic. Yeah. I don't know you. I don't believe you.

724
00:42:18,920 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 1: I don't think you realize that I don't listen to radio.

725
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:23,719
Speaker 1: I don't believe that you've not heard this song. I haven't,

726
00:42:23,719 --> 00:42:25,880
Speaker 1: all right, So Mattel filed suit, of course against m

727
00:42:25,920 --> 00:42:28,120
Speaker 1: c A. So this is actually slugging it out with

728
00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:32,239
Speaker 1: a big corporation for a change. Uh, And it ended

729
00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:34,560
Speaker 1: up as a bigger battle because of that, I'm sure,

730
00:42:35,120 --> 00:42:38,160
Speaker 1: because they can all afford big, high powered attorneys. So

731
00:42:38,280 --> 00:42:40,840
Speaker 1: they suited Mattel. I'm sorry, m c A, m c

732
00:42:41,000 --> 00:42:44,200
Speaker 1: A countered um and you know what, we're suing you,

733
00:42:44,520 --> 00:42:48,640
Speaker 1: and we can even bring in expert witnesses that basically

734
00:42:48,640 --> 00:42:51,360
Speaker 1: we'll testify that you based this on a little German

735
00:42:51,400 --> 00:42:55,839
Speaker 1: sex doll, sex doll, but you know, sexy doll back

736
00:42:55,840 --> 00:42:59,160
Speaker 1: in the day, in the nineteen fifties, And Mattel was

737
00:42:59,200 --> 00:43:02,120
Speaker 1: probably like, oh, yeah, we did kind of do that.

738
00:43:02,200 --> 00:43:04,240
Speaker 1: They had a really good point. They said, what Aqua

739
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:06,960
Speaker 1: was doing in the song Barbie Girl is not to

740
00:43:07,000 --> 00:43:09,920
Speaker 1: make Barbie into a sex object, as Mattel alleged, but

741
00:43:10,000 --> 00:43:12,160
Speaker 1: to point out that she's been one all along. Yeah,

742
00:43:12,719 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 1: and then Mattella exactly and so um. In a in

743
00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:20,560
Speaker 1: an ironic twist of fate, um, they ruled this song

744
00:43:20,640 --> 00:43:23,640
Speaker 1: was protected as parody and tossed out the defamation suit

745
00:43:23,680 --> 00:43:26,400
Speaker 1: back at Mattel. And then in two thousand nine, Barbie

746
00:43:26,600 --> 00:43:29,840
Speaker 1: actually recorded a cover version of the song and Mattel

747
00:43:29,880 --> 00:43:34,080
Speaker 1: released on YouTube to promote a line of Barbie fashionistas

748
00:43:34,480 --> 00:43:36,560
Speaker 1: that crazy. So they sued them for the song and

749
00:43:36,600 --> 00:43:39,239
Speaker 1: then they used the song I'm Sure for free because

750
00:43:39,239 --> 00:43:41,960
Speaker 1: it was a cover version sung by whoever does the

751
00:43:41,960 --> 00:43:45,200
Speaker 1: Barbie songs. This one's my favorite, Paul David. I just

752
00:43:45,239 --> 00:43:47,560
Speaker 1: felt bad for this guy. He Um. He was a

753
00:43:47,560 --> 00:43:50,000
Speaker 1: Barbie collector, a big time Barbie collector. He was on

754
00:43:50,040 --> 00:43:52,560
Speaker 1: their team. Yeah, so much so that he published the

755
00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:56,840
Speaker 1: Barbie catalog um and he in the mid ninety nineties.

756
00:43:57,280 --> 00:43:59,160
Speaker 1: Um wrote in one of his catalogs that if there

757
00:43:59,200 --> 00:44:01,879
Speaker 1: were an ugly con test, Elizabeth and Queen Barbie would

758
00:44:01,880 --> 00:44:05,320
Speaker 1: definitely win. Did you see that one? Yeah, it's Elizabeth

759
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:09,080
Speaker 1: the First. You know, it was notoriously dumpy. Yeah, it

760
00:44:09,120 --> 00:44:13,160
Speaker 1: was just, uh, it looked like Queen Elizabeth the First.

761
00:44:14,000 --> 00:44:18,480
Speaker 1: But this guy, who they had trusted to help protect

762
00:44:18,480 --> 00:44:23,239
Speaker 1: Barbie's image had written something snyde, so they brought down

763
00:44:23,239 --> 00:44:25,680
Speaker 1: the hammer of God on him. Also, they point out

764
00:44:25,880 --> 00:44:28,160
Speaker 1: that there were some he didn't put the registered trademark

765
00:44:28,239 --> 00:44:31,279
Speaker 1: symbol next to some of the photos, which is like,

766
00:44:31,560 --> 00:44:34,719
Speaker 1: if you want to give motel after you uh just

767
00:44:34,800 --> 00:44:38,239
Speaker 1: put forget to put the registered trademark next to a

768
00:44:38,360 --> 00:44:40,560
Speaker 1: photo of Barbie. Yeah, we should put that on our

769
00:44:40,600 --> 00:44:43,600
Speaker 1: podcast title. We don't want the Barbie hammer, we don't

770
00:44:44,160 --> 00:44:48,120
Speaker 1: um so Barbie sus mattel Um accuses him of copyright

771
00:44:48,160 --> 00:44:54,040
Speaker 1: infringement and um. Eventually Paul David signed a settlement agreement,

772
00:44:54,840 --> 00:44:57,279
Speaker 1: and as The Wall Street Journal reported, it stipulated that

773
00:44:57,320 --> 00:45:01,480
Speaker 1: Barbie may only be portrayed in his catalog as wholesome, friendly,

774
00:45:01,680 --> 00:45:06,360
Speaker 1: accessible and kind, caring and protective, cheerful, fun loving, talented

775
00:45:06,520 --> 00:45:11,239
Speaker 1: and independent. And what did he do? He was disgusted

776
00:45:11,239 --> 00:45:13,359
Speaker 1: and sold all his Barbies and I guess quit writing

777
00:45:13,360 --> 00:45:15,040
Speaker 1: his catalog and that was the end of that one,

778
00:45:15,080 --> 00:45:16,600
Speaker 1: Which is that's why that was so sad to me,

779
00:45:16,600 --> 00:45:18,920
Speaker 1: because he was such a huge supporter of the company,

780
00:45:19,520 --> 00:45:21,160
Speaker 1: like to be such a fan to go out of

781
00:45:21,160 --> 00:45:24,000
Speaker 1: your way to publish a catalog and then they essentially

782
00:45:24,120 --> 00:45:27,839
Speaker 1: just like squash the guy. Yeah. I remember reading this

783
00:45:27,880 --> 00:45:31,400
Speaker 1: and like many years ago and thinking like, yeah, that

784
00:45:31,520 --> 00:45:36,239
Speaker 1: was pretty awful. Yeah, but who knows, Maybe it's the

785
00:45:36,239 --> 00:45:39,359
Speaker 1: turning point for the guy. Maybe he's like, I'm free.

786
00:45:39,880 --> 00:45:43,680
Speaker 1: He walked outside and like talked to real humans. Uh

787
00:45:43,840 --> 00:45:48,040
Speaker 1: what about Barbie being banned, Chuck? Yeah, like this year actually,

788
00:45:48,080 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: in two thousand twelve, she was banned in Iran for

789
00:45:51,160 --> 00:45:54,560
Speaker 1: destructive cultural and social consequences, and they came up with

790
00:45:54,600 --> 00:45:58,080
Speaker 1: their own little doll, and girls called it ugly and fat.

791
00:46:00,680 --> 00:46:03,120
Speaker 1: I couldn't find a picture of this one. I couldn't

792
00:46:03,160 --> 00:46:05,400
Speaker 1: find anywhere. It doesn't like anything like Barbie. It's just

793
00:46:05,440 --> 00:46:09,399
Speaker 1: a doll. Yeah, oh then maybe I did see it. Um. Yeah,

794
00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:12,680
Speaker 1: the one toy seller called Barbie worse than an American missile.

795
00:46:13,400 --> 00:46:15,960
Speaker 1: But I also hear that all over Tehran, like you

796
00:46:15,960 --> 00:46:18,600
Speaker 1: can still get Barbie's no problem under the counter, but

797
00:46:18,680 --> 00:46:23,239
Speaker 1: for like, this is what I what I hear got

798
00:46:23,320 --> 00:46:26,160
Speaker 1: you this Audi Arabia band Barbie in two thousand three,

799
00:46:26,160 --> 00:46:29,520
Speaker 1: saying she was offensive to Islam and even in the

800
00:46:29,560 --> 00:46:33,160
Speaker 1: States she can't get no respect. West Virginia outlaw Barbie

801
00:46:33,200 --> 00:46:36,200
Speaker 1: in two thousand nine, or try to with a bill

802
00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:40,239
Speaker 1: deciding emotional intellectual impact she has on girls. But I

803
00:46:40,320 --> 00:46:44,080
Speaker 1: doubt it that one anywhere did. It's time now. Yeah,

804
00:46:44,440 --> 00:46:47,560
Speaker 1: we're about to talk to Gordon Jovna, the founder of

805
00:46:47,560 --> 00:46:51,040
Speaker 1: the Bathroom Reader's Institute, the guy who introduced me to

806
00:46:51,080 --> 00:46:53,160
Speaker 1: all this stuff, and we're gonna talk to him. What

807
00:46:53,200 --> 00:46:56,160
Speaker 1: about the missteps of Barbie some even more missteps. Yeah,

808
00:46:56,280 --> 00:46:59,040
Speaker 1: it tells got a great and wonderful history of it.

809
00:46:59,120 --> 00:47:06,440
Speaker 1: So let's let's bring them up. So, Chuck, we're sitting

810
00:47:06,520 --> 00:47:11,080
Speaker 1: here talking to the guy Gordon Jobna, the founder of

811
00:47:11,120 --> 00:47:14,920
Speaker 1: the Bathroom Readers Institute and publisher of the Uncle John's

812
00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:18,080
Speaker 1: Bathroom Reader series. His name's on Uncle John. No, it's Gordon.

813
00:47:18,760 --> 00:47:20,680
Speaker 1: He We tried to call him Mr job Nat and

814
00:47:20,680 --> 00:47:28,440
Speaker 1: he went crazy. We're great, we're fantastic, Thank you very

815
00:47:28,520 --> 00:47:32,120
Speaker 1: much for joining us. We're um talking about Barbie. UM.

816
00:47:32,160 --> 00:47:34,160
Speaker 1: And of course you know, we've let everybody know all

817
00:47:34,239 --> 00:47:38,080
Speaker 1: the material from the episode today. This is a special

818
00:47:38,080 --> 00:47:40,600
Speaker 1: one because normally we do this from how stuff works articles,

819
00:47:40,880 --> 00:47:44,960
Speaker 1: but we're doing this, um from just stuff that's come

820
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:48,560
Speaker 1: out of the Bathroom Readers. UM. So so we're talking

821
00:47:48,600 --> 00:47:51,359
Speaker 1: Barbie here. I feel like, UM, we've kind of done

822
00:47:51,360 --> 00:47:53,439
Speaker 1: a pretty good job setting all this up. We've we've

823
00:47:53,480 --> 00:47:59,640
Speaker 1: gone um into Barbie and Mattel's UM, I guess, troubled

824
00:47:59,680 --> 00:48:02,880
Speaker 1: history a lot. We've kind of made it clear that

825
00:48:02,920 --> 00:48:07,120
Speaker 1: Mattel is pretty good at making missteps, and um, you've

826
00:48:07,160 --> 00:48:10,640
Speaker 1: you've brought along some some other examples of ways Mattel

827
00:48:10,680 --> 00:48:12,720
Speaker 1: has just missed the mark a little bit. I guess

828
00:48:12,719 --> 00:48:16,840
Speaker 1: you could say, with some of their their Barbie's Barbie releases. Right, yeah,

829
00:48:16,880 --> 00:48:21,080
Speaker 1: we we have some examples of Barbies that created controversy.

830
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:25,080
Speaker 1: I don't know that you'd call them all missteps. At

831
00:48:25,160 --> 00:48:27,840
Speaker 1: least one of them. It's not a misstep, but certainly

832
00:48:28,120 --> 00:48:34,480
Speaker 1: certainly a controversial. Uh So the first one I would

833
00:48:34,520 --> 00:48:40,440
Speaker 1: mention is share a smile, Becky, which he'll introduced in

834
00:48:42,360 --> 00:48:46,160
Speaker 1: Yeah we laughed, then then feel bad for laughing. No,

835
00:48:46,400 --> 00:48:48,480
Speaker 1: it's kind of funny. They were actually originally going to

836
00:48:48,480 --> 00:48:52,399
Speaker 1: call it wheelchair Barbie. Excuse me, wheelchair Becky, but they

837
00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:55,560
Speaker 1: were they had an eye toward diversity. And this was

838
00:48:55,600 --> 00:48:59,360
Speaker 1: a friend of Barbies who was um confined to a

839
00:48:59,400 --> 00:49:05,279
Speaker 1: wheelchair for an unspecified disability. And incidentally, the wheelchair the

840
00:49:05,600 --> 00:49:09,200
Speaker 1: doll came with a wheelchair, little pink wheelchair, And that

841
00:49:09,360 --> 00:49:15,799
Speaker 1: was fine until um Mattel got a complaint from a

842
00:49:15,880 --> 00:49:21,239
Speaker 1: seventeen year old girl from Washington named Kirsty Johnson. She

843
00:49:21,400 --> 00:49:26,880
Speaker 1: complained that Barbie's dream House was not wheelchair accessible, but

844
00:49:26,960 --> 00:49:29,200
Speaker 1: she had a personal interest because she was she had

845
00:49:29,400 --> 00:49:34,879
Speaker 1: superbral palsy and was confined to a wheelchair herself. So then,

846
00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:38,360
Speaker 1: uh She also mentioned that the dream house. Although the

847
00:49:38,440 --> 00:49:42,440
Speaker 1: dream House had an elevator, was too to accommodate the wheelchair.

848
00:49:43,320 --> 00:49:45,879
Speaker 1: So this thing falls into another example we pointed out

849
00:49:45,880 --> 00:49:50,120
Speaker 1: earlier in the podcast. I believe that um Mattel probably

850
00:49:50,120 --> 00:49:52,520
Speaker 1: trying to do the right thing here, but in the

851
00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:55,560
Speaker 1: end sort of takes a ham pisted approach and doesn't

852
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:59,800
Speaker 1: cover all the angles. Yeah, and and there was my

853
00:50:00,320 --> 00:50:03,680
Speaker 1: was to promise a redesign of the dream House, but

854
00:50:03,719 --> 00:50:08,560
Speaker 1: instead they just dropped Becky from the Barbie line. Very

855
00:50:08,640 --> 00:50:11,439
Speaker 1: set sat into that story. That is all met tell

856
00:50:11,600 --> 00:50:13,839
Speaker 1: right there? What what else do you have for um?

857
00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 1: I know, totally styling Barbie kind of raised some some eyebrows.

858
00:50:18,800 --> 00:50:22,000
Speaker 1: I believe it did. Uh. And this is the one

859
00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:24,200
Speaker 1: that I don't know if you'd call it a misstep,

860
00:50:24,239 --> 00:50:26,799
Speaker 1: but it certainly caused a scandal. They released this one

861
00:50:26,960 --> 00:50:29,600
Speaker 1: in two thousand and nine. I had a set of

862
00:50:29,640 --> 00:50:32,640
Speaker 1: stickers that came with it that looked were like temporary tattoos.

863
00:50:32,680 --> 00:50:35,680
Speaker 1: They had two sets, actually, one for the doll and

864
00:50:35,880 --> 00:50:38,680
Speaker 1: that an example of that would be the heart with

865
00:50:38,840 --> 00:50:41,680
Speaker 1: Ken that they've been in Ken and and they also

866
00:50:42,320 --> 00:50:45,560
Speaker 1: came with a set of temporary tattoos for the girls

867
00:50:45,880 --> 00:50:49,200
Speaker 1: who played with the dolls to put on themselves. Uh.

868
00:50:49,239 --> 00:50:52,400
Speaker 1: And they were also impact on the package. They encouraged

869
00:50:52,920 --> 00:50:56,400
Speaker 1: girls to to put them their lower back, which is

870
00:50:56,520 --> 00:51:00,160
Speaker 1: what those of us, well well most people know as

871
00:51:00,160 --> 00:51:05,000
Speaker 1: a tramp stand. Uh. So parents were up in arms

872
00:51:05,040 --> 00:51:10,880
Speaker 1: because it did two things. It encouraged girls, uh to

873
00:51:11,200 --> 00:51:13,719
Speaker 1: give each other homemade tattoos, they said, And they also

874
00:51:13,760 --> 00:51:15,880
Speaker 1: said they took it was a message that it was

875
00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:18,600
Speaker 1: okay for girls to do to do trampy things. And

876
00:51:18,680 --> 00:51:20,160
Speaker 1: this is one of those things. I wouldn't I don't

877
00:51:20,160 --> 00:51:23,640
Speaker 1: know that I would call us a misstep because they

878
00:51:24,040 --> 00:51:26,120
Speaker 1: Mattel didn't agree and they left it in the in

879
00:51:26,160 --> 00:51:28,719
Speaker 1: the line and it's still available. Yeah, yeah, I guess

880
00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:30,800
Speaker 1: that would be kind of the definition of a misstep.

881
00:51:30,840 --> 00:51:34,640
Speaker 1: If Mattel doesn't back down, then it's not a misstep. Well,

882
00:51:34,680 --> 00:51:38,320
Speaker 1: which basically means does the doll cell exactly. It's a

883
00:51:38,360 --> 00:51:41,200
Speaker 1: misstep if it doesn't sell breath. And can't you see

884
00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:43,200
Speaker 1: little girls sitting around like, oh, we're out of our

885
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:46,879
Speaker 1: barbie temporary tattoos. Go get a sewing needle in some India, inc.

886
00:51:47,840 --> 00:51:50,719
Speaker 1: Let's get let's get down to brass techs here um

887
00:51:50,760 --> 00:51:54,359
Speaker 1: and we talked Gordon about Skipper already. Um. We talked

888
00:51:54,400 --> 00:51:58,239
Speaker 1: a little bit about Barbies Family Circle, um, and we

889
00:51:58,239 --> 00:52:01,600
Speaker 1: we mentioned Skipper, but we didn't mention the controversy that

890
00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:03,600
Speaker 1: came with her, like right out of the gate, right

891
00:52:03,600 --> 00:52:06,040
Speaker 1: when she was released kind of early on in the

892
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:12,120
Speaker 1: Barbie saga in ninety right. Yeah, Yeah, Skipper was Barbie's

893
00:52:12,120 --> 00:52:15,400
Speaker 1: little sister, and she was introduced actually in the sixties,

894
00:52:16,040 --> 00:52:19,920
Speaker 1: but the original plan was for them to uh make

895
00:52:19,960 --> 00:52:23,320
Speaker 1: her a little older with each subsequent release. In the

896
00:52:23,440 --> 00:52:27,640
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy five they introduced growing up Skipper, which was

897
00:52:27,680 --> 00:52:33,680
Speaker 1: controversial almost from the very beginning because what it was

898
00:52:33,680 --> 00:52:37,440
Speaker 1: was when when girls cranked her arm, she grew a

899
00:52:37,520 --> 00:52:41,880
Speaker 1: quarter of an inch taller, and she sprouted breasts, and

900
00:52:42,000 --> 00:52:45,120
Speaker 1: she got an hour glass figure and a tramp stand.

901
00:52:47,160 --> 00:52:48,880
Speaker 1: You have to put that one on yourself. Yeah, I

902
00:52:48,880 --> 00:52:51,160
Speaker 1: would be curious to see just the mechanism behind this.

903
00:52:51,239 --> 00:52:53,399
Speaker 1: I'd like to, I guess something. I'd like to play

904
00:52:53,440 --> 00:52:56,120
Speaker 1: with one, but I would like to see how that worked.

905
00:52:56,160 --> 00:52:59,400
Speaker 1: I wanted to see the doll grow. I'm interested that

906
00:52:59,520 --> 00:53:01,719
Speaker 1: the safe complicated. If you want to play with it,

907
00:53:01,760 --> 00:53:03,360
Speaker 1: you'd have to buy one, like on eBay and it

908
00:53:03,400 --> 00:53:05,799
Speaker 1: would cost you around a hundred bucks. That's not worth

909
00:53:05,840 --> 00:53:11,759
Speaker 1: it that there are YouTube videos of of the doll

910
00:53:11,840 --> 00:53:14,880
Speaker 1: in action. Perfect you go, chuck, what the link to

911
00:53:14,920 --> 00:53:18,640
Speaker 1: one of those? After this thing publishes? Um? Yeah, but

912
00:53:18,719 --> 00:53:21,600
Speaker 1: again this isn't a misstep because as I understand it,

913
00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:24,200
Speaker 1: Mattel was like, well, we'll see you all in hell

914
00:53:24,280 --> 00:53:26,320
Speaker 1: because we're not taking this one off the shelves because

915
00:53:26,360 --> 00:53:29,440
Speaker 1: again it's selling very well. That's that's correct. But they

916
00:53:29,480 --> 00:53:35,640
Speaker 1: did phase it out. Uh. In seventy nine, they introduced

917
00:53:36,080 --> 00:53:39,560
Speaker 1: super teen Skipper, which was a the breast didn't grow,

918
00:53:39,600 --> 00:53:42,160
Speaker 1: but they were a little larger than the previous Skipper.

919
00:53:42,520 --> 00:53:45,840
Speaker 1: And then a couple of years after that, they they

920
00:53:45,880 --> 00:53:49,399
Speaker 1: made her a little bit, uh, took away a little

921
00:53:49,440 --> 00:53:53,080
Speaker 1: baby fat, and and they she became hot Stuff Skipper. No,

922
00:53:53,680 --> 00:53:58,920
Speaker 1: was that really what they called her? Yeah? Hot stuff Skipper. Wow. Um, So, Gordon,

923
00:53:59,520 --> 00:54:02,480
Speaker 1: you and your rather started out before the Bathroom Reader. Um,

924
00:54:02,480 --> 00:54:05,200
Speaker 1: you guys wrote a book about the sixties and the eighties,

925
00:54:05,320 --> 00:54:08,920
Speaker 1: and you guys mentioned Barbie in that book, right, So

926
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:11,080
Speaker 1: what did you guys say? We said it was a

927
00:54:11,120 --> 00:54:14,360
Speaker 1: pop culture book, very early pop culture book about the sixties.

928
00:54:14,360 --> 00:54:17,880
Speaker 1: And and um we said in the introduction that Barbie

929
00:54:18,600 --> 00:54:24,880
Speaker 1: was as important a cultural icon as any anything that

930
00:54:24,920 --> 00:54:27,840
Speaker 1: happened in the nineteen sixties. And we were lamb based

931
00:54:27,840 --> 00:54:31,240
Speaker 1: in the or Lamb bastard whatever in the in the press,

932
00:54:31,600 --> 00:54:35,640
Speaker 1: in reviews for you know, like somehow putting Barbie over

933
00:54:35,680 --> 00:54:37,640
Speaker 1: the war in Vietnam or civil rights right there, And

934
00:54:37,680 --> 00:54:39,799
Speaker 1: we weren't. But we just felt that that this was

935
00:54:39,960 --> 00:54:44,000
Speaker 1: going to be a lasting, uh cultural image and we

936
00:54:44,000 --> 00:54:47,480
Speaker 1: were a little ahead on that. Laughing now exactly. Well,

937
00:54:47,520 --> 00:54:50,200
Speaker 1: let's talk about your books. Um, you guys are releasing

938
00:54:50,200 --> 00:54:54,640
Speaker 1: the twenty five anniversary of Uncle John's Bathroom Reader. Cong congratulations.

939
00:54:54,640 --> 00:54:58,680
Speaker 1: That's enormous. Um, so what what what tell us a

940
00:54:58,680 --> 00:55:02,520
Speaker 1: little bit about this? Well, um, you know, we never

941
00:55:02,600 --> 00:55:04,680
Speaker 1: thought we would be doing this for twenty five years.

942
00:55:04,680 --> 00:55:07,600
Speaker 1: And I should say that the actual inspiration for doing

943
00:55:07,640 --> 00:55:11,320
Speaker 1: the Bathroom Meador was my brother's idea to give credit

944
00:55:11,320 --> 00:55:14,680
Speaker 1: where credit is due. But um, you know that first

945
00:55:14,719 --> 00:55:19,960
Speaker 1: book was two pages long, and we are our latest one,

946
00:55:20,040 --> 00:55:22,960
Speaker 1: Uncle John's Fully Loaded Bathroom Reader. We uh we made

947
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:25,960
Speaker 1: it six hundred and eight pages, so it's a it's

948
00:55:26,040 --> 00:55:29,480
Speaker 1: quite a giant book that covers a zillion topics and

949
00:55:29,840 --> 00:55:33,080
Speaker 1: just like any other bathroomador, only a little more so. So, um,

950
00:55:33,760 --> 00:55:37,200
Speaker 1: where can everybody find the anniversary Well, all of your

951
00:55:37,200 --> 00:55:40,280
Speaker 1: books where where? Where's the best place to find them? Well,

952
00:55:40,600 --> 00:55:43,879
Speaker 1: hopefully your local bookstore will have Uncle John's fully loaded

953
00:55:43,920 --> 00:55:47,399
Speaker 1: Bathroom Reader. Certainly the chain bookstores like Barnes and Noble

954
00:55:47,440 --> 00:55:50,400
Speaker 1: will have it. Um, you can get it at Costco,

955
00:55:50,560 --> 00:55:53,480
Speaker 1: Sam's Club, get it online from Amazon, or you can

956
00:55:53,480 --> 00:55:57,920
Speaker 1: get it online from US at bathroom reader dot com. Cool.

957
00:55:58,040 --> 00:56:01,560
Speaker 1: We'd love to have people visit us. Uh and sometimes

958
00:56:01,600 --> 00:56:04,120
Speaker 1: they make suggestions of what we should be including, and

959
00:56:04,160 --> 00:56:07,440
Speaker 1: that's fantastic. Hey, thank you very much for joining us. Um,

960
00:56:07,520 --> 00:56:11,040
Speaker 1: you guys are doing the anniversary edition of Uncle John's

961
00:56:11,080 --> 00:56:13,879
Speaker 1: Bathroom Reader. It's available pretty much anywhere you can find

962
00:56:13,880 --> 00:56:16,719
Speaker 1: a book, right. Absolutely. I will be looking forward to

963
00:56:16,760 --> 00:56:19,120
Speaker 1: reading it this Christmas. So thank you very much, Gordon

964
00:56:19,239 --> 00:56:22,080
Speaker 1: job Now we appreciate you. Thank you, Josh, and thank

965
00:56:22,080 --> 00:56:29,080
Speaker 1: you Chuck. Thanks god bye, Well Josh. That was awesome.

966
00:56:29,680 --> 00:56:31,520
Speaker 1: Thanks for hooking that up man. Sorry I was a

967
00:56:31,560 --> 00:56:35,800
Speaker 1: fanboy kinda No, it was great. Uh, Like whenever you

968
00:56:35,880 --> 00:56:38,840
Speaker 1: can get the real people on the line, and sometimes

969
00:56:38,880 --> 00:56:41,000
Speaker 1: it happens, you just gotta do it. I'm just glad,

970
00:56:41,040 --> 00:56:43,440
Speaker 1: he answered. I mean like we were really running a

971
00:56:43,560 --> 00:56:47,280
Speaker 1: gamble by calling him in the middle of recording. That's true. Alright,

972
00:56:47,320 --> 00:56:48,719
Speaker 1: So shall we finish up with a few of them,

973
00:56:48,920 --> 00:56:51,880
Speaker 1: the more odd Barbie dollas throughout the street. These aren't missteps,

974
00:56:51,920 --> 00:56:56,040
Speaker 1: are just unusual. Yeah, and I'm sure there was not

975
00:56:56,160 --> 00:56:58,759
Speaker 1: a marketing campaign behind any of them. There's side to

976
00:56:58,800 --> 00:57:02,400
Speaker 1: Another Country or come there is Alfred Hitchcock's the Bird's

977
00:57:02,480 --> 00:57:06,080
Speaker 1: Barbie and this Barbie looked like Tippy Headron from the movie,

978
00:57:06,600 --> 00:57:10,719
Speaker 1: and it has three blackbirds attached to her, so they're

979
00:57:10,760 --> 00:57:16,440
Speaker 1: like perpetually attacking her. Yeah, she's being attacked by blackbird Barbie. Uh.

980
00:57:16,800 --> 00:57:18,960
Speaker 1: My favorite is Pooper Scooper Barbie. And I guess this

981
00:57:19,120 --> 00:57:22,280
Speaker 1: is to teach girls, or I guess boys they play

982
00:57:22,320 --> 00:57:24,680
Speaker 1: with dolls. We've been seeing girls the whole time. Um.

983
00:57:25,440 --> 00:57:28,440
Speaker 1: It comes a little Golden Retriever named Tanner who eats

984
00:57:28,520 --> 00:57:32,360
Speaker 1: and poops and really poops. And Barbie has a little

985
00:57:32,360 --> 00:57:34,360
Speaker 1: shovel and pale to be a responsible dog owner and

986
00:57:34,680 --> 00:57:37,880
Speaker 1: curb her dog. That's what you can inspire to do.

987
00:57:38,120 --> 00:57:41,479
Speaker 1: That's right, Um, there's the McDonald's one, which we talked about.

988
00:57:41,560 --> 00:57:43,600
Speaker 1: She's wearing a headset which I think threw you off.

989
00:57:43,720 --> 00:57:46,880
Speaker 1: But can a franchise the work at his or her

990
00:57:46,960 --> 00:57:53,200
Speaker 1: own store? Yes, taken to me. The most bizarre one

991
00:57:53,320 --> 00:57:59,080
Speaker 1: of all time is I Love Lucy sa Barbie. Oh yeah,

992
00:57:59,680 --> 00:58:03,120
Speaker 1: I thought again, say George Washington Barbie. It's pretty bizarre, alright.

993
00:58:03,160 --> 00:58:05,360
Speaker 1: So what's I Love Lucy One? That I Love Lucy

994
00:58:05,440 --> 00:58:08,000
Speaker 1: Santa Barbie is based on a specific episode of I

995
00:58:08,080 --> 00:58:11,560
Speaker 1: Love Lucy from nineteen fifty six, and Barbie is dressed

996
00:58:11,680 --> 00:58:15,880
Speaker 1: as Ethel Mertz, who is dressed as Santa Claus. That's

997
00:58:15,960 --> 00:58:19,640
Speaker 1: the weirdest Barbie ever. She's not dressed as Santa. She's

998
00:58:19,720 --> 00:58:22,120
Speaker 1: dressed as Ethel from I Love Lucy dressed to Santa.

999
00:58:22,480 --> 00:58:24,760
Speaker 1: My like, my mind is mush. Yeah. I think some

1000
00:58:24,880 --> 00:58:28,720
Speaker 1: Mattel like employee higher up was like hammered on eggnog

1001
00:58:29,200 --> 00:58:33,720
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve watching this George Washington's episode and said, uh,

1002
00:58:33,920 --> 00:58:37,680
Speaker 1: I got a great idea, and I guess George Washington

1003
00:58:37,720 --> 00:58:42,960
Speaker 1: Barbie followed, actually preceded in and that's pretty much straight up.

1004
00:58:43,040 --> 00:58:46,880
Speaker 1: She is dressed like George Washington in his Revolutionary War uniform.

1005
00:58:46,960 --> 00:58:50,680
Speaker 1: That's right, except that's pink in it. There's an NBA Barbie,

1006
00:58:50,720 --> 00:58:52,640
Speaker 1: which doesn't seem all that weird. You can get all

1007
00:58:52,720 --> 00:58:56,920
Speaker 1: the different teams, right, there's never been a w NBA Barbie.

1008
00:58:57,280 --> 00:59:01,720
Speaker 1: That's the weird part. X Files Barbie. That's a little strange. Yeah.

1009
00:59:01,880 --> 00:59:05,200
Speaker 1: There was a can dressed as uh Ducovny's Fox Molder

1010
00:59:05,680 --> 00:59:08,560
Speaker 1: and of course Barbie dressed in a pant suit as

1011
00:59:08,800 --> 00:59:14,280
Speaker 1: uh Scully Goldie Horn Barbie. I loved that Goldie hawn

1012
00:59:14,360 --> 00:59:16,800
Speaker 1: and laughing. Yeah, that's who it's based on. Yeah, with

1013
00:59:16,880 --> 00:59:18,920
Speaker 1: a bikini and the tattoos. It's just sort of an

1014
00:59:19,040 --> 00:59:21,360
Speaker 1: iconic television figure. Yeah, I mean, what are you gonna do?

1015
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:25,360
Speaker 1: Wildcats Goldie on that was terrible, yeah, or Ruth Buzzy Barbie,

1016
00:59:26,360 --> 00:59:33,520
Speaker 1: you know, um wowdcats Goldie on overboard Goldie hawnks. There

1017
00:59:33,640 --> 00:59:36,560
Speaker 1: was Harley Davidson. Barbie is a bike or chick from

1018
00:59:37,000 --> 00:59:40,480
Speaker 1: head with head to toe leather. That's right, it's weird. Um.

1019
00:59:40,640 --> 00:59:43,680
Speaker 1: And then there's a bunch of other just slightly noteworthy ones.

1020
00:59:43,800 --> 00:59:48,600
Speaker 1: French Made Barbie, Lady of the Unicorns, Barbie, civil Ward,

1021
00:59:48,720 --> 00:59:54,880
Speaker 1: Nurse Barbie, John Dear Barbie urbane. Yeah. I looked up

1022
00:59:54,960 --> 00:59:56,760
Speaker 1: urban Hipster Barbie, and I thought it was gonna be

1023
00:59:56,840 --> 01:00:00,160
Speaker 1: like some Brooklyn chick with Hornero glasses, and it was this.

1024
01:00:00,560 --> 01:00:07,720
Speaker 1: It looked more like uh, foxy brown, like black exploitation Barbie.

1025
01:00:08,480 --> 01:00:11,240
Speaker 1: They called it. That's what they called urban hipster, like

1026
01:00:11,360 --> 01:00:15,760
Speaker 1: big Afro, sort of like African American goddess. Wow. Yeah,

1027
01:00:16,560 --> 01:00:18,800
Speaker 1: if it was urban hipster today, it would be she

1028
01:00:18,800 --> 01:00:22,520
Speaker 1: would have a mustache and glasses, live in Williamsburg. There's

1029
01:00:22,560 --> 01:00:27,840
Speaker 1: Star Trek Barbie and Ken Barbie's dresses, Lieutenant hura Um

1030
01:00:28,240 --> 01:00:32,720
Speaker 1: Nascar and John Deere Barbie's bowling Champ Barbie. This one,

1031
01:00:33,040 --> 01:00:35,520
Speaker 1: this is one of my favorites. Barbie and Ken is

1032
01:00:35,600 --> 01:00:39,600
Speaker 1: the monsters. They have so much fun, those two. And

1033
01:00:39,680 --> 01:00:42,439
Speaker 1: then of course the Pepsi. Barbie also had the Coca

1034
01:00:42,480 --> 01:00:46,000
Speaker 1: Cola Barbie to do battle and the Cola Wars. Because

1035
01:00:46,040 --> 01:00:48,480
Speaker 1: if there's one thing Mattell doesn't want to do is

1036
01:00:48,520 --> 01:00:54,400
Speaker 1: to offend any segment of the American population. That's it. Man,

1037
01:00:54,440 --> 01:00:56,480
Speaker 1: You got anything else? No, I think In Loui of

1038
01:00:56,520 --> 01:00:59,520
Speaker 1: Listener Mail, we had the interview and we just want

1039
01:00:59,560 --> 01:01:01,800
Speaker 1: to say thanks to get into Uncle John's bathroom. Here. Yes,

1040
01:01:02,000 --> 01:01:05,840
Speaker 1: thank you very much for everything all these years. Appreciate

1041
01:01:05,880 --> 01:01:08,560
Speaker 1: you guys, and we appreciate you guys too for listening.

1042
01:01:08,640 --> 01:01:11,000
Speaker 1: Agreed Um. If you want to get in touch with us,

1043
01:01:11,360 --> 01:01:13,600
Speaker 1: you can tweet to us at s Y s K Podcast,

1044
01:01:13,920 --> 01:01:16,240
Speaker 1: join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff you Should Know,

1045
01:01:16,760 --> 01:01:20,040
Speaker 1: or you can send us an email. Uh to Stuff

1046
01:01:20,160 --> 01:01:28,440
Speaker 1: Podcast at Discovery dot com for more on this and

1047
01:01:28,560 --> 01:01:31,080
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics. Is it how Stuff Works dot

1048
01:01:31,120 --> 01:01:37,200
Speaker 1: com h