Barbie is a toy icon. She is promoted as a “regular girl” that every girl has and should look up to.
He-man is a superhero.
Not the same.
@Kattywampus69 there is a lot of room between negating and equating
@Kattywampus69 to me, this post implies that Barbie is unreasonably vilified and that He Man is just as bad. But it’s not the same, at all.
For girls, this is a deep rooted cultural issue. Girls and women are inundated with messages every day of their lives that tell them that their appearance is the most important thing about them, that they are falling short of the (unattainable) standards of society, and this starts very young with, for example, Barbie.
He man is a superhero. Boys might want to be him but they don’t grow up with the persistent message that they are expected to be this. It’s not the same.
@Kattywampus69 my point is that Barbie IS a standard and HeMan is NOT.
Just look what steroids can do: bulging muscles, skinny waist and oversized torso, and no, well, genitalia (look at that tiny wrap).